I was inspired to write this after reading the exploits of Nerv Alaska, written by AMIADREAM. That story is based in the same universe as Gregg Landsman's story, Neon Genesis Evangelion: Nobody Dies. They're both excellent and I recommend reading them.

This is the first time I've ever really written anything like this, kind of a combination of detective and spy genre. I'm fairly proud of it, but I know it's not my best. I've stuck mainly in the genre of fantasy. Still, doing this is a neat experiment and I'm glad AMIADREAM gave me permission. I believe it goes without saying, but I don't own Evangelion or the two works mentioned above. So without further ado, I present NERV Alaska: Aftermath.


NERV Alaska: Aftermath

Hidden Agendas and Old Friends

It had been almost a month since NERV Alaska was destroyed in a destructive event that, according to satellite imagery, resembled a smaller version of Second Impact. All the area above ground, and the first lower layer after they had cleared some of the rubble, had been examined carefully. Which, of course, also meant slowly. While it is known by those with enough clearance that Antarctica is safe enough to visit it doesn't mean that the scene should be handled carelessly. After all, would every impact have the same events occur? Would the after effects be consistent? The truth of the matter was that disasters of this nature had never occurred often enough for a reliable study to be made on it, so it had to be handled with care. Which is why, after almost a month, a preliminary report was compiled. Doctor Jack Lawson, being the head of research and development at NERV 3, would be one of the few men in the world to receive a copy of this report. Indeed, he has been reading it for the last hour.

"This is a crock," he muttered to himself as he threw the thing on his desk. He sighed and leaned his head back in his comfortable, padded leather chair. Doctor Lawson was, for all intents and purposes, a bit of a hedonist. His office reflected this. His desk was made of beautiful, polished red oak. Considering the rise in water levels had flooded the East Coast this made such a desk a fair amount more expensive than it used to be. His floor was covered in a magnificent Persian style rug of intricate design. Bookshelves lined the walls of the room, filled to the brim with old books of numerous subjects, some of which had only a few copies in the world. On his desk was a gold and silver chased pen, which rested delicately on a stand. Next to it was a bowl filled with candy, which Dr. Lawson reached a hand into and popped into his mouth as he let his mind wander. There were other papers on the desk that demanded his attention, but he honestly didn't care. Those could wait while he dealt with this.

He ran a hand through his thinning red hair and rested another on his, admitably, round stomach. He was trying to think objectively on the report, but his thoughts kept drifting toward one thought in particular. Dr. Mondschein was dead. Dream, one of his oldest and best friends, was dead. He had known the man since college, had engaged in all sorts of rivalries and extraordinary hijinks as they tested the boundaries of science. That man was dead, and his superiors honestly expected him to just accept what this report was implying? That Dream had run an experiment that had just gone out of control, killing himself and everyone under him?

"Bastards don't know a damn thing about him," he growled as he chewed on the hard candies. "Dream would never be so careless!"

He pushed himself forward, steepling his hands under his chin. His green eyes stared out at nothing, focusing inward rather than outward. He couldn't let this stand. He had to find out more about what had happened, for the security of NERV 3 and in the memory of his friend. The only question was how. He suspected that SEELE was involved in this, somehow. The Old Men had fingers in everything, after all. If he made too many overt moves to look into it be knew that he would have his movements restricted at best. At worst he might wake up one morning with a bullet in his brain. He had access to Section 2 agents, but even those who he knew personally could be compromised. SEELE would find a way, most likely through threatening the families of the agents. The Old Men were ruthless.

Dr. Lawson found himself distracted by other friends he knew, alive and dead. There were, unfortunately, far too many on the other list. But as he did, an idea rose in his head. He had another old friend of his who might be able to help him, though the man would probably not be happy to see him. He picked up his phone.

"Hello, Commander? I was thinking I should take up some of the vacation time I've built up. Been working a little too much lately."

ooooo

Marcus Roland was not having a good day. He was walking the windy streets of Chicago trying to find some lunch. At least, it had begun that way.
He was tall, as these things were measured, six feet tall and fit, though not as fit as he used to be. He didn't gripe about that too much. He was pushing fifty and felt he was entitled to not have to work too much. Not that he ever really had a chance to do that. The wind rustled his trench coat and made his short, wavy brown hair sway a bit. He found it refreshing to feel the wind over the hard angles of his face. He rubbed the stubble on his chin a bit and looked around surreptitiously.

His sharp brown eyes noted another one leaning on a street corner reading a newspaper. It was the little things that tipped him off. The way the man held himself, how he had one hand lower on the paper than the other. Lower so that he could reach his firearm more quickly. His stance, though seemingly relaxed, gave off little signs that he could burst into motion at the slightest instant. Only someone who had been trained to look for these signs would be able to really notice. The casual observer would be clueless.

That was the fifth one he had noticed so far, which confirmed that he was being herded somewhere. They knew that he knew, which meant they also knew that he knew there were more of them than he had noticed. So he played along. The last thing he needed was a sniper's bullet lodged in the back of his head.

Moving down the street, following the directions of the inconspicuous men, he eventually found himself at a little pizza place. He noticed the man sitting behind the window and groaned.

'Great. Him.'

Marcus made his way inside, standing in front of the seated man who smiled up at him. There was a large deep-dish pizza steaming in the middle of the table, two plates on either side of it.

"Hello there, Mark. It's been a long time. How's being a P.I. treating you?"

"Not long enough, Lawson. I distinctly recall saying that I never wanted to see you again."

"Mark…"

"Things were said when I quit that can't be unsaid, Lawson. Things said by you and by me. Grow up. We're not in college anymore and I don't have the patience to deal with your crap."

"Mark, if you would just listen…"

"No, I will not listen! You send out whatever new black ops NERV has to herd me out here and you expect me to be reasonable? Hell no, Lawson. God, you haven't changed at all."

"Dream's dead, Mark."

Marcus's jaw dropped. Eventually, after several minutes, he was able to find his voice. "What? How?"

Dr. Lawson motioned for him to sit. Marcus did so and put his face in his hands. The good doctor allowed him time to process the information. Marcus had been one of his best friends, once. He was a friend of Dream's too, and from what he knew the two had kept in touch some. They had been inseparable back in college, and it was usually Marcus who bailed them out of whatever insane scheme he and Dream had managed to cook up any given day of the week. He had been their anchor to reality, the rock that kept them steady. That had lasted well outside of college, and it had helped them all stay afloat during the chaos that was the Impact Wars.

Eventually Marcus spoke again. "How did it happen? I talked with him over the phone a little less than three months ago."

"Dream was the head of NERV Alaska, and he died when it exploded."

Marcus nodded. "I saw something about that on the news."

"Heavily edited, of course."

"Of course. I know how things work."

"You would, wouldn't you?" He said with a smile. "After all, you were only part of Gehirn's security and black ops for how long? Five years?"

"That's over and done with," Marcus growled. "Too many memories and too much bad blood."

"Mark, it wasn't your fault…"

"Shut up, we're not talking about that.'

Dr. Lawson sighed. "All right, Mark. I got a preliminary report that implies that Dream brought the whole thing on himself, but I don't buy it. I think SEELE's trying to cover something up. How much do you know about them?"

"Enough to know that I don't want to know too much. I don't need those guys looking in on me."

"Mark, don't be naïve. They probably already know everything about you."

"That's such a comforting thought. But yeah, Dream may have been crazy when he got in the mood, which was often, but he'd never be so careless with other people's lives."

"Exactly. I want to know what happened to him, but if I'm too overt about it then I'll be put down hard."

"What you're doing now isn't overt or strange?"

"Mark, I'm considered more than a little insane by my staff and superiors. It's practically a prerequisite for the higher-ranking positions in NERV's organization. Commandeering a few Section 2 agents to herd my grumpy friend into a pizza parlor I've taken over? It's hardly the strangest thing I've ever done. Remember the chicken incident in college?"

"Really haven't changed," Marcus mumbled as he took a slice of the pizza. It had everything on it, which was good. He was hungry. He took a bite out of it as the man in front of him did likewise with his own slice. He remembered the chicken incident, all right. His friend had tried to create a better, more efficient feed for chickens, to make them grow bigger and produce more food. Dream had thought the idea was brilliant, and he had to admit even he had been excited about the idea. What had actually happened was the creation of chickens the size of wolves, which then proceeded to take over the school. All three of them were lucky to avoid getting expelled for that one.

"So where do I fit in with this?" he asked after he had finished another slice.

"I want you to look into this. Any man I send in Section 2 may be compromised in some way, but I know you, Mark. You don't have any next of kin. There's nothing SEELE can leverage over you."

"Besides my life."

Dr. Lawson blinked. "Well, yes. There's always that."

Marcus let out a little sigh. He wanted to argue, but he already knew what he was going to do. There was no point in bandying it about. "I'll look into it. Dream was a friend. I want to do right by him. Still, how much do you expect me to be able to figure out all on my own?"

"More than we know now. Thank you for this, Mark. Really, thank you. Here, I'm giving you a journal of everything I know about NERV Alaska under the tablecloth. I don't trust the computers on base to make a digital copy of this. Mostly it's from memory. You never know who's going to be poking around in your network. Inside the journal is a communication device that only sends to one other just like it, which I own. It will hopefully allow us to communicate with each other in secret."

Marcus took the journal and stealthily snuck it into his trench coat. He could feel a vaguely phone like object under the cover, very thin and lightweight.

"All right then, I'll get to work. I'll keep you updated, but don't go thinking this makes up for what happened between us. I'm doing this for Dream, not you."

"Mark, how many times do I have to apologize? I didn't mean it!"

"Some things can't be unsaid, Lawson. What happened then, what was done afterward… I can't forget it."

Marcus stood up.

"Thanks for the pizza."

He stepped outside into the windy chill of Chicago and hunched his coat up a little more. As he walked back to his office to set up what he would need, only one thought crossed his mind.

'The next few months are going to suck.'