UT Evangelion
Chapter 1: Spiteful Unrest
Shinji rolled over in his cot and glared at the alarm clock on his bedside table as if it had personally insulted him. It was a way that had he still been in the Tournament he would have used before a match on the opposing team's captain, not so much to intimidate the other warrior but to put on a good show for the cameras and all the people watching across the galaxy. That had been a big thing for him eight years ago: appearance. Back then he wouldn't dare coming out into public without a black suit, intimidating sunglasses and pair of pants stocked with pens to deal with the inevitable onslaught of clamoring fans and their unending need for autographs.
These days, he didn't even bother to shave, much less dress classy. The dirty moss green sleeveless shirt he wore to bed and now intended to wear all day under his battered dark blue jacket evidenced this sloppiness. Not that he would be going out in public today or for the next week for that matter. After Kawrou's death (labeled 'an unfortunate malfunction of his armor's respawning device' by Tournament officials) Shinji had realized just how grotesque and wrong the killing of a human really was. During the rematch of that fateful game, Shinji wasn't able to fire on his opponent in the face of the recent trauma and received a shot to the forehead as consequence. Upon respawning, he couldn't stop shaking and suffered a post-traumatic seizure.
As soon as he was released from the treatment center a day later, Shinji resigned from the Tournament and used the money he had built up from his team's championship win the season before to purchase a run down cargo ship. To this day he could still remember Asuka's reaction when he told her he was done…
--
"What the hell do you mean you're through?" Asuka fumed.
After just losing the final match of the season due to a distinct lack of the team's captain, Asuka was decidedly less than thrilled to be hearing the man who had started Angels of Darkness informing her that he was done fighting in the Tournament. What pissed her off the most was how the post match interviews toward her and Rei hadn't been about why they had lost, but rather what was wrong with Shinji. Due to the fact that Rei never said much anyway, Asuka had taken all the questions on herself and had gone so far as to threaten one reporter who had suggested that Shinji could be quitting the Tournament. Now Shinji himself was telling her it was true.
There he stood, before her in the locker room in his trademark black suit and tinted sunglasses that he had worn comfortably out on many dates with her. Now, however, it seemed as though he would be comfortable in anything but these familiar articles.
"I'm through Asuka," he repeated, "I just think that I should be doing other things."
The little shrug that had accompanied his excuse only served to add fuel to the fire of her anger.
"Bullshit! You're running away from the truth! You think I didn't feel sad when Kawrou died? Huh?" she asked.
At this Shinji lowered his head and looked at his shoes. For all of his power and commanding personality, Asuka could still reduce him to the height of a few centimeters with the shouting of a handful of words. Fighting alongside her while at the same time dating for four whole years had its effect on the levels that they understood each other, even without words expressed during the more…erotic moments of their relationship.
"I know you felt sad, Asuka. But he was my best friend, you know?" Shinji said sheepishly, trying to make her understand.
"And I was standing right next to him when he died!" Asuka countered.
"That's not the same thing!" Shinji shouted, "We grew up together, traded cards, rode our boards and double dated in school. I'd known him my entire life. The physical distance between us when he died has nothing at all to do with it. Besides, it showed me that what we do is sick."
"Sick?" Asuka asked, "Sick? You leaving because of one accident is what's sick, Shinji Ikari!"
"He was my best friend," Shinji repeated.
"And I'm your girlfriend! Doesn't that matter?"
Shinji stepped forward and grabbed her by the shoulders.
"Yes, yes it does matter. Just because I'm done doing this job doesn't change the fact that we love each other."
Asuka looked away from him and let her gaze drop to the floor. At the sudden realization of what that meant, Shinji's grip on her shoulders slackened considerably.
"I'm sorry Shinji, but for me it changes a lot more than just that," she muttered, her eyes not visible below her red bangs.
Shinji let go of her and stepped back. Slowly, she turned and opened her locker, creating an intentional barrier between the two people. After a moment's hesitation, Shinji left the locker room and didn't turn back.
--
After recalling the incident in his mind, Shinji shuddered a bit in a mixture of embarrassment, loss and regret for the pain he had caused Asuka. In immediate following to those emotions was the feeling that what he had done back then was not only in the past but also in the right. Standing up out of his bed, Shinji pulled his blue jacket on and slid into his shoes, which automatically tightened around his feet and fit snuggly in place. He walked out of his quarters into the hallway of the cargo ship he had run and called home for the past eight years: Spiteful Unrest.
The ship's name hadn't come about as any kind of meaningful poetic thought so much as the pressing need of a name for the ship after he saved it from the scrap yard with the aid of quite a chunk of change. When confronted with the naming form, he had scribbled down the two words in a hurry and left, eager to get away from the world he had called home since birth. Throughout all those years of running cargo between colonies, Shinji had never once stored anything illegal. The way he figured it, he needed neither the trouble nor the money from it.
What he had needed after this many years, though, was help. Two months ago he had hired on an eighteen-year-old kid out of the mining planet Kurudash named Storm Thorton. He was a nice enough kid and could perform the mundane tasks necessary to keep the crusty old vessel working as well as possible. The only qualm Shinji had about hiring him on was the kid's need to ask questions about his past every once in a while. It wasn't that the questions were above anything more than 'what's your favorite weapon?' but they still got Shinji thinking about those times when he was captain of something besides a cargo ship.
Upon entering the bridge of the ship, Shinji found Storm sitting with his feet up on one of the two consoles, hands clasped behind his head and watching the vid screen mounted above the main window. On it was this year's current Tournament, a capture the flag match to be exact. When Storm heard the door slide shut he reached for the remote control to turn it off.
"No," Shinji said flatly, "It's fine."
Storm looked at Shinji over his shoulder for a second before leaning back into his chair like he had been before.
"Thanks Captain," he said.
Shinji grunted in reply and sat down at his own console. Unlike Storm's, which was adorned with pictures of his parents and multiple girlfriends, Shinji's console had no such customized items. Due to his family's close ties with the Tournament, not even pictures of his parents existed here, or in his cabin for that matter. Anything related to his previous life had been left behind when he walked out on his team eight years ago. Today he began with running a remote system's check of everything on the ship from fresh water and oxygen levels to the status of the engine's reactor, not paying any attention to what Storm was watching.
"Wow, what a great match. That certainly was interesting, wasn't it Malcolm?" asked the emotionless voice of a robotic post-game anchor on the vid screen.
Shinji heard it, and knowing Malcolm personally from way back when, was prepared for the deep rumbling voice that was sure to follow the robot's question.
"Yeah you're right, sure was exciting. But that's to be expected from those two teams. Being so new to the Tournament causes them to fight like animals," Malcolm replied.
"Good old Malcolm," Shinji muttered to himself while watching the system's check run its course.
"You say something, Captain?" Storm asked.
"Nah," Shinji replied, "Just thinking out loud."
"Well next up is a Team Deathmatch exhibition between the Heavy Hitters, a team made up entirely of Juggernauts, and last year's champions, Angels of Darkness," said the robot anchor.
Shinji spun around in his swivel chair expecting to see Malcolm and the robot but instead saw a series of clips showing the new Angels of Darkness 2.0. As the images played, Malcolm gave commentary on the team and who was on it.
"Aside from their team captain Asuka Soryu's tabloid escapades with teammate Toji Suzahara getting enough spotlight for the entire team, there are still other things going on with Angels."
"Like what, Malcolm?"
"Like the new line up. I've talked with Asuka and even played on her team during off-season exhibitions and if there's one thing I know it's that she demands absolute perfection. That's why she kicked out Aida after last years flag fumble in the semi-final."
Shinji watched as a clip of an armored man wearing glasses received a headshot five feet away from depositing the flag on his back into place for the capture. The flag fell to the ground and a member of the opposing team ran through it, causing it to return to its original place of resting.
"With the new season starting up soon, she got the empty slot filled damn fast," Malcolm said.
The screen switched to show a sleek looking female Liandri-made synthetic wielding a ripjack. It was soft purple in color and moved gracefully in a series of high leaps and executing precision shots from mid-air somersaults.
"Her name is Casper," said the robot announcer, "And she is the next evolution in Liandri robotics. With three times the reflexes of a normal human and physical prowess of a Juggernaut, she is the very embodiment of the fighting spirit. One of a trio of synthetics which are all undoubtedly faster, stronger, and better than their predecessors."
"Wow," Storm muttered.
Shinji spun away from the screen and back to his console with the intention of resuming his daily tasks.
"Hey Captain, what do you make of that?" Storm asked, having not been oblivious to Shinji watching the vid screen.
As much as he hated to admit it, Shinji actually was interested in what Casper could actually do in a competitive match. Having been a regular competitor from eighteen to twenty two, he couldn't help but wonder. But what he had really gotten out of that segment wasn't that Angel's of Darkness had a new android, but that Asuka was in charge of it. At the time of his departure, Shinji was sure that the team would crumble without him as its leader. He hadn't thought that because he particularly wanted it to crumble, but more out of what he had held as common sense. That it was still fighting and winning with Asuka as its leader was something that had Malcolm not just said it he would have considered loony.
But he couldn't tell Storm all that.
"I don't make anything of it to tell you the truth, Storm," Shinji replied.
In fact, why hadn't Storm ever mentioned that the team was still going on? He'd watched the recent Tournament, no doubt, so why didn't he mention it? On the contrary, all of his questions to date had revolved around Shinji's past in the Tournament. But maybe it was because the young man didn't want to make his boss, the man who paid and housed him, angrier then need be.
"And now the moment you've all been waiting for," the robot on screen said, before allowing Malcolm to take up the announcement.
"Heavy Hitters versus Angels of Darkness. Let's rock!"
Shinji stood up out of his seat and headed for the bridge's exit, not wanting to see the blood sport about to be played out on screen.
"You aren't gonna watch it, Captain?" Storm asked.
"Nah, I think I'll go check the cargo bay," Shinji answered and walked out of the door.
He marched down the hallway toward the cargo bay with his hands plunged deep into the pockets of his blue jacket. On his way he passed the restrooms, the waste storage, janitorial closet and then the cafeteria. Five feet past the last room, he stopped. The cafeteria had a vid screen, the only other one on the ship…
"No," he stated firmly to himself.
But just as he said the commanding word, he knew he didn't mean it. Angels of Darkness had to have changed drastically, as did their now-leader Asuka. Reluctantly, Shinji turned around and walked into the cafeteria, took a seat at one of two tables in it and turned on the vid screen. It was already on the channel and Shinji immediately saw that the unofficial ritual of pre-game taunting was beginning. Unlike the televised wrestling matches of hundreds of years ago, these taunts were not scripted and came directly from the dark depths of each team captain's heart. First he saw the Heavy Hitters step up onto stage, their team captain simply massive in his armor. Then the Angels stepped up, Asuka tiny and petite compared to her opposite, yet with a look just as determinedly pissed.
No matter how long he had been away from the sport, he simply had to watch this.
