Greetings from your favorite author, CloudDancer1014. I have a very special treat for you today!
This story was a joint project that me and an author known as Tellemicus Sundance worked on. It is based off mastermage's "Shinji Saotome", and is done with his blessings. Unfortunately, TS lost his motivation for this story and dropped out. However, that hasn't stopped me!
These first few chapters will be mostly TS's work. This was his brainchild for a while, so I'll not change what he has come up with so far. I'll let you know when my stuff starts coming in.
For the record, I do not own Ranma or Neon Genesis Evangelion. All I own is the computer that I write it on, and only because I won't let my creditors sell it.
Also, while I am at it, I have converted a forum into a storage center for all of my story ideas. I have yet to see anyone comment on it other than me, so please go check that out. As for my tales, expect something from Past Lives soon, followed by my Case Closed Cross. Time Traveling Martial Artists will only get updated if I can find what happened to a chapter that has disappeared on me.
One more thing! I need a volunteer for a beta! Any help would be nice, but I have another chapter of Time Traveling Martial Artist that I managed to salvage from previously lost files, and it is in desperate need of editing. Someone? Anyone?
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Tears pouring down his cheeks with all the finesse of a waterfall, Ikari Shinji's world were enveloped by a blinding white light originating from the small mirror he held.
It was with almost painful clarity that he watched as memories were dredged up randomly among the chaotic energies swirling around him and his EVA.
On top of the bamboo poles rising out the many pools were two figures who were engaged in combat, looking for all intents and purposes like they wanted to kill each other. The fact that they were jumping impossibly high didn't escape his notice, but was just another thing to add to his newly started 'weird-things-list'
He stood there, transfixed by the sight before him; never had he seen such grace.
'If I could do that…' he trailed of as the boy, he looked around 16, kicked the fat man into one of the pools.
With the light came an overwhelming sense of weightlessness, as though he were floating in zero-gravity. All his senses were completely overwhelmed, even the sheering pain that was burning through his left arm and right thigh from where he'd been shot.
With a great splash two male bodies landed in a spring.
Somehow, though vague sense of awareness, he could feel himself tumbling through space and time.
Ranma had calmed down a lot and quickly took notice of the boy sitting in the corner, quietly watching them. "Um, my name is Saotome Ranma, what's yours?"
Shinji looked up and gave a meek smile. "I'm Ikari Shinji. Nice to meet you."
That gave him a sense of bitter satisfaction. The perverted freak was right; the mirror was working!
"Listen, old man! You will adopt him, otherwise I won't go with you anymore, and you can stick your plans up your ass!" he spoke with an uncharacteristic growl in his voice, and Genma quickly decided to abide to his wishes. His son was quite deadly when enraged. He gave a small nod.
"Ok" he spoke in a small voice, then louder. "Ikari Shinji, I hereby make you a member of the Saotome clan!" 'I can always knock Ranma out and leave the boy behind' he thought reassuringly to himself.
Ranma whirled around and smiled brightly at Shinji.
Looking around him, Shinji watched silently as what appeared to be wisps of smoke began to gather around him in the brightness.
Ranma's grin got even wider. "Good! We will start your training today…"
Somehow Shinji had a foreboding sense of doom when Ranma gave him a change of clothes to put on.
Memories continued to race through his mind as the smoke began to slowly condense.
Shinji cocked his head to the right. "Somehow I have a feeling that's not the only reason you're here, is it?"
"Of course not. We came here searching for husbands."
Shinji's eyes narrowed. "You should know that you won't get Ranma!"
Cologne cackled. "Oh, you shouldn't worry so much about your brother. He's not the only one we're hunting. On that note, let me introduce you to some of your greatest fans. SPICE, PEPPER!"
Shinji nearly dropped his groceries in shock when the meaning of Cologne's words finally sank in. 'This has to be a joke!'
Then he noticed that the girls whom he had watched earlier were looking at him strangely. It was a look that made him very uneasy. Both girls drew their swords and started running towards him. "I'll make you mine!"
Shinji's eyes bugged out. "Uh OH!"
Tears of bitter sorrow and weak amusement continued falling from his eyes. The gathering clouds were steadily beginning to block out the bright light.
Shinji shifted on his feet. This had to be one of the most awkward moments in his life.
Kaori shifted on her feet as well. This was the most awkward moment in her life.
After nearly two minutes Shinji, being more used to these situations, was the first to speak. "Guess that's means we're fiancées now?"
What was once a blinding bright light was now only dull haze of gray. The clouds of time were steadily darkening, encompassing the traveler as he neared his arrival.
"I take it Ranma has already told you about the full body cat's tongue?"
Several nods confirmed Shinji's question.
"Well, let's just say he isn't the only one with that little problem now."
Stunned silence followed that statement.
That vague sense of awareness told him that he was 'slowing down' as the light began to fade.
"Kachu Tenshin Amaguriken!"
As darkness was now filling in around him, he could slowly feel his normal senses beginning to return to him. The brief respite he'd gotten from the terrible bullet wounds was too rapidly returning to him.
After Shinji finished talking Happosai nodded his head thoughtfully. "Well, seeing how that purple ugly thing on TV isn't explained away that easily I'm ready to believe you. The question is, what do you want to do now?"
"Go in there, bust a few heads, and get Unit 01 out, of course!" Ranma said with his usual arrogance.
Finally gravity returned, pulling Shinji's injured body to the bottom of the Unit 01's entry plug.
"Get up you two. Time for the next try." Cologne informed them from the branch she was standing on with a tone that betrayed how much she was enjoying this.
'I hate my life' thought both Saotomes at the same time as they dragged their beaten and bruised bodies up into standing positions to continue training.
That day Ranma and Shinji learned something very important:
Impacting a boulder is very painful.
Impacting a boulder without being prepared was very, very, very painful.
Where a blinding light had once dominated all his senses, an overpowering blackness had replaced it.
Thinking it over again Shinji nodded decisively. "I think the problem is I have too much power and not enough skill. That's why the training isn't so hard at the moment. My mind is playing catch up with my body!"
Shinji didn't know or care how long he sat there in darkness. All that he cared about was watching the remaining few memories he had left. They were all he had left to remind him of all he had done and whom his life had been so thoroughly entangled with for the past few months. The tears that had been raining down his face slowly stopped and dried, leaving trails down his cheeks.
If Kasumi and Nabiki intended to tag along…well, then Shinji had to ditch everyone but the person he needed to get back to his own world. It was sneaky and despicable behavior to leave everyone like that, but at that point Shinji thought it necessary.
Getting Happosai's cooperation took no more than being groped in various pieces of lingerie in female form, which brought him back to the present: Running towards the nearest train-station in the middle of the night to meet his grandmaster, who had assured him they could get into the military base by themselves.
Slowly, he became aware of a weak noise. It was coming from outside the darkness that was his prison and sanctuary. Vaguely, from somewhere in his earlier memories, he knew that the noise sounded familiar.
"Don't worry, your companion is okay, I only knocked him out. If you do what I want, no one will be hurt." He told her, forcing his voice to stay level with every shred of his will, knowing full well that he wouldn't hurt her even if she did not do what he wanted. The trick was to make her believe otherwise.
Slowly he removed his hand from her mouth, but kept a firm grip on her arm.
"Now, show me the way to the giant robot."
The noise was a voice. A voice filled with hope, fear, and desperation. It was calling his name over and over again, but he made no attempt to answer it.
"You idiots. Don't shot from down here! If you hit the opening mechanism we may never get it open!"
Whoever said that seemed to have some authority, because the guards did as told and started following after him. Shinji could not help but snicker, despite the situation. Thanks, whoever the hell you are.
Another five steps brought Shinji before the code-pad, his fingers hammering in the 40 characters needed to open the door. The armored hatch opened with a satisfying hiss, and a moment later the entry-plug appeared, winding its way out of the EVA's spine.
"He opened it!" he heard the disbelieving mechanic that had ordered the guards to stop shooting, shout. "Shoot him!"
The entry plug hatch's was finally pulled open, blinding light poured into the darkened interior, momentarily blinding the pilot.
"Shinji!" a familiar voice cried. "Are you alright?"
His vision clearing, Shinji gazed up at a face he'd not seen in months. It was Major Katsuragi Misato, his commander and supervisor while he worked for NERV in Tokyo-3. She had tears streaming down her cheeks as she stared down worriedly at him, waiting for some kind of reply.
Shinji just continued to stare blankly up at her, his mind still vividly attached to the images and memories that had comforted him for the past few hours. He was only partially paying attention as Misato threw herself at him, hugging his still form tightly.
As Misato continued her teary embrace of him, Shinji quickly felt his earlier exhaustion finally catching up to him. The pain in his body was still very much present and burning no less fiercely that it had when he'd left. After awakening at three o'clock in the morning, sprinting several dozen miles after hitchhiking a ride on a train, infiltrating a heavily guarded military base, and being shot several times before finally reaching his EVA and 'transporting' it safely away, he was very, very tired.
I didn't even get to say goodbye to any of them, he realized miserably. In a voice just loud enough for Misato to hear, he whispered, "I just…wanted to see them…one more time…" Finally giving into his body's yearning, Shinji's mind slowly slipped into blissful unconscious.
But before he'd fully been enveloped by its comforting shadows, another familiar voice decided to make itself known. With her usual rough and commanding tone, Asuka snidely demanded, "Weren't you going to punish him?"
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Dr. Akagi Ritsuko and Commander Ikari Gendo both stood in front of Unit 01. The purple behemoth was currently being rinsed of the Angel's blood that had so thoroughly coated it. Both of the two leading personnel of NERV were wrapped up in their own thoughts as they stared up the purple monster before them.
All Commander Ikari could see as he stared at the thing was the beautiful face of his long-lost wife. He had tried everything he could and still she remained trapped inside that creature's bowels. But now as he gazed upon it, he couldn't help but question. Did she have something to do with Unit 01 somehow tearing itself out of the Angel that had consumed it and Shinji?
That would mean that his theory and hopes had been correct all along. His dear wife was still alive inside that thing! His determination to free her just continued to grow with every passing moment he took staring up at the EVA.
Dr. Akagi, however, was beset by some far different thoughts. When Unit 01 had torn its way free, the sight of the blood-drenched EVA had chilled her to her very soul. And yet, as terrifying as the EVA was, something else was bugging her. And if there was one thing she disliked, it was not understand something.
Several things had been discovered when they'd finally managed to get Unit 01 safely back inside the NERV headquarters and recovered Shinji. Gone was the plugsuit Shinji had worn when he left to battle the Angel. The boy had somehow acquired a white Chinese-styled shirt with a pair of black pants, simple shoes, and he had a small mirror clutched tightly in his hand.
But the missing suit and Shinji's new attire wasn't the only confusing thing either. It had been quickly noticed that someone or something had been tampering Unit 01 at some point. Several pieces of its armor had been removed and were missing, and there were also signs of tampering around the entry plug as well. As though someone had been trying to take the EVA apart.
Not only that, but it was discovered by the doctors who were cleaning and tending to the wounds that the boy had somehow acquired that Shinji had also acquired incredible new amounts of muscle mass. No more was he just an average, yet very scrawny teenager, he had grown muscles all over and it gave him the appearance of a dedicated martial artist from the days before Second Impact.
"I will expect a full report on my desk tomorrow," Gendo said, snapping Ritsuko from her contemplations. "I want to know what happened to Unit 01 and the Third Child to put them into such states."
If he had been anyone else, Ritsuko might've thought that he was concerned for his son's wounds. But she knew that he only wanted to know if what had happened would have some kind of adverse effects on his plans.
"Yes, sir," she said, returning her gaze to the purple behemoth that was still being heavily bathed. "I'll have it ready as soon as I can."
Oh yes, she was very interested in what Shinji would have to say about all this!
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Slowly, consciousness returned to the boy. For a moment, he wondered why it was so quiet. Surely with Ranma and Akane in the same house, there'd at least be some senseless bickering going on right? Or there'd be sounds of fighting as Ranma and Genma or Ryoga went about their daily training in their arts. And why didn't he smell any of Kasumi's wonderful cooking either? That young lady was positively impossible to keep away from the kitchen and he should know since he'd tried several times in the past few months.
Opening his eyes, Shinji saw an unfamiliar ceiling above him. The room was as quiet as a tomb, but it was far from being as dreary. The walls were perfectly measured and painted a bright white, seemingly glowing from the light that was streaming in through the large windows to his left side.
Movement from that side quickly caught Shinji's attention, what he saw quickly brought a flash of memories screaming through his mind. There, sitting quietly beside his bed, was Ayanami Rei in her usual school uniform. But if she was here, that would mean that…he was back in his original world and time.
Rei quickly noticed that he was awake and staring at her. The two of them just stared at one another in silence for a moment. Rising into a sitting position, Shinji easily ignored his bandaged wounds. They were nothing more than a dull ache at this point, a type of pain that he had grown very accustomed to after training with the greatest martial artists he'd ever met for several months.
"It's okay," Rei said, a hint of a comforting tone in her voice. "You can rest today. We will take care of everything."
"But…I feel just fine," he said, speaking just as quietly as her.
Since Shinji was currently staring at the bandage covering his left elbow, he failed to see the ghost of a smile that crossed Rei's face as he said that. She could easily see that something had changed about the young Ikari, not just his slightly longer hair or new muscles. His character had…matured somehow.
"Well," she said quietly, a hint of affection in her tone. "That's good for you."
Standing up, she made to leave. Now that he had recovered consciousness, Dr. Akagi would likely put him through a thorough series of tests and demand some kind of report on how he'd come to be injured.
"Rei?" Shinji's voice brought her to a halt just before the door. "…it's nice to see you again."
Rei didn't reply or turn around. But if she had, Shinji would've seen the tiniest of smiles come across her face at that moment. But when she'd pressed the button to open the door, surprising an eavesdropping Asuka in the process, Rei's face had returned to its usual cool indifference.
After the door closed behind Rei, Shinji couldn't help but chuckle quietly at Asuka. He knew her pride forbade her of ever showing concern for anyone other than herself or those she'd somehow deemed worthy of her time. And after her countless cries of disgust, distrust, and outright hatred towards Shinji, she most certainly couldn't bring herself to properly check up on his well-being. Hiding behind doors and walls, listening in on other peoples' conversations, was the only way she'd allow herself to show any concern for him or others.
In a way, it was how Akane had been around Ranma in the first few months that they'd lived with the Tendo family.
Glancing around the room, Shinji spotted a pile of clothes neatly folded upon the bedside table. He instantly recognized the blood-stained shirt and pants as the ones that he'd been wearing as he stormed the military base to reach his EVA. Resting peacefully atop the bundle was the small mirror that he'd been given by Happosai. The sight of that mirror brought a weak smile to his face.
Reaching out, he grabbed the small instrument with all the loving grace as though it were made of extremely fragile glass. His weak smile reflected back up at him as he gazed into the mirror.
'It worked, Ranma.' he thought quietly. 'It worked...I'm back."
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Coming up: More of TS's excellent writing, whenever I get around to posting it. My portion will be coming soon!
