I know I shouldn't do this but this fic is something that's been knock around in my head for a while. I decided to do it to take my mind off my other fics for a while. As such the chapters will be much shorter than I usually put out, but may come more frequently, in between the chapters of XVII and anything else I start. Worry not, XVII is still coming along nicely, the delay was due to the fact that I moved house and it took an age to get the webternet up and running again. This little piece is set in what I like to call 'the happy years' of the Eva story arc: i.e. before the shit begins to hit the fan. After about the 11 Angel -when the pilots are getting on the best- not that that's saying much...- the Angels stop coming. I'll explain why later, but it's not relevant to the plot. As such the Eva's are pretty useless in this story. Time has passed...
And so it begins...
I don't own Evangelion or Spider-man
Red and Blue.
"Hurry up, Ikari!" Shinji gasped aknowledgement and tried to sprint faster, keeping his tall friend in sight as he beckoned impatiently. Kensuke ran just ahead of him, arms windmilling and legs flailing in some spastic excuse for a run. A few seconds later both of them scrambled up the metal steps and onto the waiting school bus. Shinji couldn't help but notice the faces smirking at the two of them out the windows as they ran, each seemingly amused at the two stooges graceless entrance. Doubled over trying to fill his lungs with sweet, lifegiving oxygen Shinji was hit by the stifling heat of the bus' interior. Hearing the desolate groan from next to him it seemed he wasn't the only disappointed one. Scrubbing the sweat out of his eyes he followed the exhausted Kensuke down the middle of the bus towards the seats Touji had managed to save for them, ignoring the smirks on route, and trying not to meet the eyes of the teachers that were accompanying them..
"Looks like the Stooges strike again. Geez, it's not like it's hard to be on time for a bus..." Asuka's voice, quiet but just loud enough to carry - just as she had intended - made Shinji stiffen slightly when he heard it before continuing onwards. It was too hot for him to care about her jibes. The laughter of the other students made his face brighten slightly, fortunately unnoticeable over the flush he was already sporting after the unintended physical excess of a few minutes ago. Reaching the seat Touji had saved he collapsed into it thankfully, before groaning at the feel of the warm leather on his back and legs.
Kensuke had slumped down in his seat next to Touji and was still gasping for breath. Shinji moved his neck sluggishly to look over the back rest at him in amusement. Eventually Kensuke raised his head and leant back in his chair. Touji glanced between the two of them.
"So did you manage to get it?" Kensuke grinned tiredly, his breathing falling back to normal. Triumphantly he held up his palm computer and nodded. Touji grinned and high fived him excitedly. Shinji shook his head tiredly and slumped further down into his seat. Three years and they still hadn't changed a bit. He stared out the window at the passing scenery, hearing the two of them whispering animatedly behind him.
Three years. He'd been in Tokyo-3 three years now. He sighed and watched the trees flash past. So much had changed, and at the same time not much at all. The Angel's had stopped coming after the 11th - some kind or virus in the Magi. He hadn't been told much and only that months after it had actually happened so he didn't know much. But that had marked the end of the battles. Aside from that his life still ran the same track for the most part. He still went to Nerv for sync tests, just in case the Angel's ever did return. He still lived with Misato Katsuragi in her tiny apartment. And his best friends were still Touji and Kensuke.
This was his life. He couldn't help but smile. It was his life and he was happy with it. Shinji's mind skipped to his friends, hearing Touji's muffled whoop of excitement behind him. In three years their friendship had grown and strengthened. It had gotten to the point where they were nearly inseparable. Misato had told him they were more like brothers than friends. Friends can go through a lot in three years.
He and Kensuke had convinced - well, badgered, bullied, threatened and harassed - Touji into asking out Hikari Horaki two and a half years ago and the two were still together. Hiraki understood the bond the three of them shared and didn't begrudge her boyfriend the time he spent with them. It didn't matter much. As often as not she and Asuka would end up joining the three of them and Touji always seemed to find one or two nights to be alone with her, be it taking her to dinner or seeing a movie or just hanging out. Shinji had to admit he was surprised at his sometimes clueless friend being such an attentive boyfriend, but was glad it was the case. Sadly Hikari had transferred schools to an American one at the beginning of the term, as part of an exchange opportunity the two school were running. She would be back at the end of the term, in summer and though the two of them kept in touch via email and phone it was clear that Touji was missing her.
He and Touji had been there when the first girl Kensuke asked out - a Sumiko Naresawa - turned him down. It wasn't cruel or crushing but the otaku had still been understandably disappointed. They had rented an absurd amount of old Godzilla movies and spent the weekend having a marathon, before collapsing into giant lizard induced comas. Kensuke hadn't asked many people out since then but it always seemed to Shinji it was more that he hadn't found anyone he really liked in that way, rather than just being to afraid to ask anyone out. He seemed happy living the single life and was content to keep doing so.
Three years. And they were still his best friends. He heard another whoop behind him and grinned. They really hadn't changed at all. Kensuke had gotten himself and Touji hooked on an anime series a year ago. Whenever it was on they were practically bonded to the couch and refused to move unless the building was falling in. Hikari had given it up as a lost cause after a few nights, seemingly chalking it up as one of her boyfriend's quirks. It had recently been announced that a movie of the anime was being released and the fan-boy mania had started anew. Every time they met the first things Kensuke and Touji did were exchange any new info they had on the movie, it's plot or a release date. In their spare time they scoured the net for sources information. The period before they left for the annual school trip - this year to Nerv Industrial Technology Labs - had been a free so they had immediately congregated around the computer in the library sifting the web. Shinji had tagged along out of boredom. The trip to NITL was to be the subject of their report in Biology and was therefore pretty much essential for all students to attend. Especially the three stooges, who all needed good marks in the class to stop their grades rapid descent.
Just as they were meant to leave for the bus Kensuke had stumbled across a trailer of the movie on a web site and feverishly began to download it onto his palm computer. Touji had been told to run on ahead and hold the bus. At first he had refused, saying that there was no way he was going to leave at such a momentous occasion as this. He argued that Shinji could go.
Kensuke disagreed with him, saying that he was faster as well as being belligerent enough to be able to hold the bus. He didn't think Shinji would be able to do it. He had flashed an apologetic grin as he said and the brown haired pilot had waved off the comment with a smile. Touji had still seemed indecisive until Kensuke had stood and grabbed him by the shoulders.
"If you don't do this we won't have time to download the full trailer for 'Funi Bunshin 5000'. The bus will leave without us. We just can't take that risk. Our grades can't take that risk. We need you to do this." Touji's face had hardened in determination and he nodded resolutely. "For the Bunshin?"
"For the Bunshin, buddy." The two had embraced, garnering several weird looks from the rest of the library and a tired sigh from Shinji. He liked the way they hadn't even considered not downloading the trailer until another time, in favour of there grades. Which in short, was why he and Kensuke had been forced to sprint from the library to the bus in the courtyard, praying that it had not left without them. Sure they could always rely on Touji to take notes and then copy his... but Touji was not well known for his note taking. The last time Shinji had been forced to borrow his notes he had spent more time actually deciphering the scratchings that Touji insisted was writing than he did actually concentrating on the subject matter. So that was out of the question then. They had to be on that bus. Exactly why Shinji had ended up sprinting for his life when he didn't even care about the damn thing was an area on which he was still hazy.
Right now the two of them were watching the trailer on Kensuke's palm computer. He had swapped his camera for the tiny gadget a while back on the grounds that the palm had a built in camera as well and it could do much more as well so he told everyone that he was upgrading. Shinji watched them writhing in the seat, trying to conceal their excitement and not doing a very good job of it. Touji plainly wanted to start punching the sky in pure joy and Kensuke wasn't that far behind. They had their heads together, with one ear bud each and were staring at the tiny screen on the palm avidly. Shinji shook his head and looked around the bus for something else to occupy his attention, seeing as his two friends were distracted.
His eyes, as always, were drawn to the unusual. And in a sea of brown and black hair and blue haired girl and a redhead were very unusual. Rei and Asuka sat next to each other a few rows ahead of him. While not the best of friends they had become closer since the end of the Angelic attacks. Sometimes Rei would be seen with Hikari and Asuka now, thought it was a bit much to say that the redhead had ever actually taken a liking to the taciturn albino it had gotten to the point where she tolerated her company. If Hikari had been there it would most likely have been her sitting next to the volatile redhead rather than Rei. Rei had not really changed - not becoming much more loquacious at all, but she seemed more at ease in other people's company. She freely spoke to Shinji now, if only to exchange greetings or basic enquiries into his health. Asuka... Asuka was Asuka and that's all there really was to it. You don't expect a tornado to suddenly invert itself and you don't expect Asuka Langley Sohryu to change. She had moved out of Misato's apartment at the beginning of the year, stating that it really was too crowded in the tiny home. She had been relocated to the apartment next door and very little had actually changed. She was still around at Misato's for dinner most nights seeing as Shinji was the only one who could actually cook and they still walked to school together in the morning. The only real difference was that he didn't have to battle for the bathroom in the morning anymore.
"So... what's this trip about again?" Touji's words and Kensuke's exasperated sigh signalled that they were finished with their obsession for another day. Well, for a few hours at least.
"We're going to Nerv Industrial Technology Labs to look at some of the basic work they've done with gene splicing." Touji's blank look made it clear that this explanation had not helped matters much. The bespectacled otaku sighed again. "Gene splicing is where they mix the genetic makeup of two or more species together." The dawn of understanding shone in the jock's eyes.
"Like an octo-parrot?"
"Well, uh, yeah, I suppose..." Touji's face curled into a grin.
"Cooool."
Shinji rested his face in the palm of his hand and sighed.
"Keep together now! We don't want anyone wondering off and getting lost. This is an extensive facility and..." Mostly ignoring their sensei's warnings of dire retribution for any who should stray from the preset path, the three Stooges brought up the rear of the group, Kensuke avidly scanning his palm's camera lens across anything that caught his attention, Shinji with his hands in his pockets and his eyes on the floor and Touji with his arms behind his head and gazing up through the elaborate glasswork of the foyer ceiling. The crowd of students came to a halt in the centre of the extensive entrance hall, standing in the centre of the bustle of the Industrial Labs. Shinji looked up to see their aged teacher was speaking to a dusky woman with obsidian hair in a lab coat that vaguely reminded him of Ritsuko Akagi. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Asuka sighing impatiently and resting her fists on her hips in her trademark stance of annoyance. Rei stood by with her hands clasped without any determinable emotion.
"So when do we get to see the octo-parrot?"
"There aren't gonna be any octo-parrots! Or any penguin-wallabies! Or anything else similar!" Kensuke turned to his taller friend in exasperation only to sweatdrop as he heard the jock mumbling under his breath.
"Penguin-walrus, huh?...Cooool." Shinji smiled. The teacher turned away from the lab-coated woman and addressed the class.
"All right students!" The group quietened down, dropping into silence. "This is Dr Naomi Stresser. She'll be being our guide today. Please save any questions until the end." The caramel skinned woman stepped forward and smiled at the mass of teenagers. Her voice held the soft lilt of an American accent.
"Hello to you all. As your sensei has already told you my name is Naomi Stresser and I'm one of the Section Heads here at the Labs. As you all know we are going to be looking at some of the basics of gene slicing and some of the earlier specimens of our research." A not-so-very-hushed murmur spread through the crowd at her words. It seemed the majority of the students had the same ideas as Touji in mind. Naomi smiled again and raised her hands, beckoning for quiet. After a few seconds the mass complied. "Unfortunately these specimens will be rather... tame compared to what you are probably hoping for. There won't be any... oh, I don't know, um...octo-parrots for example." She grinned and shrugged her shoulders, suddenly looking startlingly young.
Shinji heard Touji choke on air next to him over the slight disappointed groans and chuckles of the class. He turned to see his friend's eyes bulging and his jaw hanging loosely.
"It's a sign... It must be!" Shinji sighed and turned away from the jock, despairing. Naomi had apparently carried on speaking because the rest of the class was moving away towards a hallway to the left. Shinji and Kensuke made to follow them with a slightly dazed and suspicious Touji bringing up the rear. The corridor itself was reminiscent of the ones in Nerv headquarters, complete with moving walkway. The left side of the hallway was a transparent window, opening out into a series of labs below. Each one was compartmentalised and sealed from the rest, their high vantage point leaving them able to see the whole of the complex like a 2D floor plan rather than the 3D actuality. Shinji watched in curiosity as men shuffled around the rooms wearing bulky yellow contamination suits. He had seen something similar used in the coolant cylinders of the bakalite chambers at Nerv, but knew these ones were being used to maintain a sterile environment in the laboratory rather than to protect the user.
The had arrived at the end of the corridor and stepped off the moving walkway last, though Kensuke stumbled slightly because he was concentrating more on looking through the sight of his palm computer then on where he himself was stepping. Touji still looked slightly zoned out and was mumbling to himself. There was a brief pause while Naomi slid a thin access card hung around her neck through a slot reader allowing the doors to open before the class dutifully trooped through into the area beyond.
Eight tiny eyes watched them enter without interest. They were far too big for it to concern itself with.
Shinji heard Kensuke gasp lightly next to him and watched him pan the camera sight up into the shadows that shrouded the high ceiling. The room was almost cavernous by normal standards but years of walking through Nerv's colossal constructs had jaded Shinji a little. Suffice to say it was no Eva cage. However it was at least 6 meters high and at least half again as long in both width and breadth. It appeared to be a lab much like the ones they had seen on their way there, thought the scientists were not wearing the yellow contamination suits and there seemed to be less of them despite the fact that the room was quite a bit larger than the others.
Naomi walked to the centre of the room, halting and turning to face her audience in front of a set of metal cubes with transparent fronts, nine in all in three rows of three. The ended a couple of inches over the woman's head.
"Normally this is a initial and final analysis department for... well doing exactly what it sounds like, really. All preliminary information and test simulations are done here and all the final data compiled. Basically a 'before and after' room. But since you were all coming today we thought we'd give you a look at some of the specimen data in it's mid stages. Like a cut section of the whole thing in a way. Also..." Naomi smiled again and gestured towards the 'cubes' behind her. You'll get the chance to have a look at one of our first projects and one of the senior professors who worked on the project will talk you through the procedures and techniques used to give birth to this unique creature." She stepped to the side a little and gestured them all closer. The students crowded forward to see what the cages held. Shinji, Kensuke and Touji were left at the back unable to see much of anything.
"So? What is it?" Kensuke muttered, still focusing his attention of on the camera view rather than his own. Seeing as the palm had a zoom function on it he was probably getting a better view then Shinji was. Naomi laughed.
"Maybe this will give you a better view." She pulled a small cylindrical object out of her lab coat, much resembling a fountain pen and pointed it to a large screen that Shinji had not thus far noticed. The flat screen flickered to life and showed a blown up image of what looked like a tiny arachnid. The body was bulbous and it's legs were relatively small and slender. Shinji had seen plenty of spiders and this one seemed more like a tiny money spider but bigger, instead of a tarantula or anything larger. However it's colouring was very distinctive. The majority was a dark cobalt blue, while it's legs and parts of it's abdomen were a bright crimson. The markings on the abdomen looked like a twisted hourglass that had prominences reaching around the circumference of the spiders's body.
"This is one of our first experimentations of gene splicing. We took the genes and DNA of three separate spiders and combined them to make this new breed. Super spiders if you will. One of the originals produced some of the strongest webs known in existence, capable of holding exceptional weights for it's construction. The second was startlingly strong, able to lift up too twenty times it's own body weight in the most extraordinary cases." As she spoke she gestured with the 'pen' twice and showed the class pictures of two far more mundane examples of the arachnid kingdom. One was a dusty brown and the other a dull black. She continued. "The last was known to be incredibly agile. It's one of the fastest species of spider and capable of almost hilariously long jumps." It struck Shinji suddenly that Naomi didn't much speak like a scientist, as some of the class quietly chuckled at her description.
"The reason I'm being vague about the capabilities of these individual spiders is because I'm not entirely sure what they are. All the exact information will be given to you by the man who headed the project, rather than myself who merely stood over him with a shotgun looking threatening and demanding results." The class all laughed at that.
"Hey, she's not joking. She actually did that kind of thing." A tall dark skinned man - only a few shades lighter than ebony - stepped out from behind the cages, ticking off boxes on the notepad he was holding absently. He grinned at the class, showing off startlingly white teeth. He continued in his deep bass voice. "But when she wasn't trying to pistol-whip progress out of me, Naomi made a great boss." The dark haired woman rolled her eyes before speaking.
"This is the project head, Samuel Masset. My subordinate." The last was thrown offhand at the tall man with a smirk. It was the man's turn to sigh and roll his eyes.
"Yeah well, whatever. Anyway we might as well get started then, unless anyone had any questions I can get out the way quickly?" He looked at the crowd expectantly. A boy named Shoji nearer the front raised his hand, along with a few others. Samuel noticed the young man first and gestured for him to speak.
"Why did you pick a spider? I mean, it's not like there's much point in creating a super-spider is there?" Samuel shook his head.
"In terms of practicality, no, not really. When we designed the spiders we were more interested in testing out the theory behind the gene splicing techniques we thought might work rather than actually producing something of any real use to anyone. Next?" The dark man gestured to Tokio, a girl with a high pony tail and thin framed glasses.
"How long do the new spiders live for?"
"About six months. To be honest, the ones in the cages are third generation. We originally engineered two females and four males, to make breeding a potential but not overdo it. The ones here are part of a much larger collective we have stored elsewhere. Yes, you there?" A boy Shinji couldn't see spoke, but he wasn't really paying attention. He had followed Kensuke over to the cages, which eh rest of the class had left to get a better view of the screen. The otaku was trying to get a close-up of the small arachnid on his recording facility.
"There we go..." He spoke softly, under his breath. Since the beginning of the year he had been a photographer for the school newspaper and it's internet cousin. As such he had decided to get as much footage as possible. Having finished recording some video of the spider in motion he stepped back to get a few snaps for the paper. As he was squinting through his view finder a red blur obscured his view.
"What are you doing?" Shinji and Kensuke looked up to see Asuka in the way of the shot. Rei was standing a little way to the side.
"Taking pictures for the paper." Kensuke answered shortly, before shifting his position to see around her. She moved with him almost absently.
"So you'll be needing someone to stand in shot then?" Shinji blinked at this quasi-galactic leap in logic. Kensuke, on the other hand, saw it as an opportunity to annoy the redhead, something he was privately lobbying should be made an official school extra-curricular activity.
"Yeah I suppose I will...Hmm..." Asuka's triumphant smirk shattered like thin porcelain at his next words. "Ayanami? Would you mind? It'll just take a second." The blue haired girl stepped forward quietly, her attention drawn away from the beginning of the explanation that Samuel was providing the rest of the class. Asuka fumed silently. For a change. Suddenly Kensuke's grin, was swept of his face by the tsunami of fear as she leaned in towards him, eyes sparking furiously. Shinji looked around hurriedly, finding no one looking in their direction and Touji standing nearby and staring off into the distance.
"Hey, why don't you both stand in the shot?" Asuka's attention turned to him, her eyes burning into him rather unnervingly. After a few seconds she reigned in her laser stare and huffed quietly.
"Fine. Come on Wondergirl." Asuka pulled the taciturn girl towards the cages and quickly stood where Kensuke directed her, mumbling comments about he was undoubtedly perverted for thinking about positioning her body like she was some kind of Barbie doll. Kensuke quickly took snaps of the girls -Rei looking expressionlessly at the camera and Asuka doing the spontaneous cute face she managed so well.
"Mood swing much?" Shinji muttered under his breath, through a small smile. Kensuke continued to take a few more pictures, turning his camera to a portrait angle and then repeating the shots so he had back-ups. Asuka asked why it was taking so long and he replied that he needed different shots so the editor had more options about what to do with the articles presentation. She seemed mildly offended that he actually had a legitimate reason.
Shinji continued to watch and listen in amusement. Abruptly he noticed a shimmering silver thread hanging next to his face. Staring at it for a few seconds in confusion he lifted his hand to touch the thin strand. A few seconds before he came into contact with it, his hand erupted in pain. Grunting louder than he intended Shinji jumped back a bit, cradling his suddenly inflamed hand, watching a distinctive blue and red shape fall to the ground and try to scuttle away. The brown haired otaku turned to see what was the matter and absently stepped on the small arachnid in the process. Shinji kept staring at the place it had been, an area now occupied by Aida's foot.
"Shin-man? You ok?" Shinji snapped his head up to look at his friend and seeing Asuka looking at him with a frown and Rei regarding him stoically from over his shoulder. He opened his mouth to reply that he was fine - the pain had quickly faded to nothing - before he realised he was feeling very faint and dizzy. A few seconds later he felt himself falling and heard the dull cries of the others through the roaring and howling of his own blood in his ears..
"Shinji!"
"Ikari!"
Well that's the first chapter done. All the other chapters will be done the same length - around and about. The plot line will be very different from accepted Spider-man canon so don't worry. Its not going to be Spider-man but with Shinji Ikari. There'll be more to it then that. More importantly who do you readers want to end up playing as Mary-Jane? I need a reason people. Not just a demand. All reviews welcome. Yes, even the bad ones.
Ja Ne - Till laterer is now.