Disclaimers: Let's continue with the rehtorical questions. If I wanted to make money off this fic, would I post it on a free-access site?
Warnings: Well, although there wasn't any actual sexual innuendo in the last episode, it was more of a general warning of what was to come. Starting with this episode. Oh, and there'll be the standard violence and language, too. If you have a problem with either of those, then I'd like to know how you made it past the first fight scene in the last episode.
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The New World
Episode 2
Max Kleitel stretched and yawned happily. He felt a little claustrophobic inside the Yggdrasil's halls, but there were more than enough perks to living in the giant submarine to make up for that slight discomfort.
Besides which, he knew that it was just a residual attitude implanted in him during the changes that the Third Impact wrought upon his body. While he had always been athletic, he had never been able to jump three times his height effortlessly. Of course, the cat part in him also brought along its fair share of phobias, such as his current claustrophobia, or his fear of water.
He sighed at that. He had been one of the lucky ones. At least the Third Impact had affected him beneficially, for the most part. Many others had become misshapen mutants or even worse, had been killed outright. Of course, there were rumours that a very few people had been turned into supermen by the Third Impact. He had discounted those rumours until about a week ago, when he met Shinji Ikari.
The two of them had fought bitterly, Max as a giant tiger, and Shinji with his bare hands. Shinji wasn't a superman, Max knew from personal experience, but he was definitely more than just human. No one should have walked out alive, let alone victorious, out of an encounter with a weretiger.
Eventually, he reached his destination, the Yggdrasil's command centre. It was early morning, before either of the ship's commanders usually came in, so he was often able to learn more from the bridge crew then than he would normally.
He entered stealthily, sliding unnoticed over to a position right next to the door, and proceeded to watch the bridge crew's actions. His long and bushy tail swished lightly back and forth as he stood there. That's one of the perks of this place, he thought, they can design clothes to accomodate the most unusual things. He no longer had to stuff the damn thing into his pants uncomfortably, instead, it just stuck out of a specially designed hole in the seat of his pants.
It wasn't long before Major Katsuragi came in. Taking one sweeping look at the bridge, she noticed him standing off to the side and sniffed derisively. As she made her way past him to her command chair, he made a soft sound deep in his throat that caused her to stiffen, then stomp the rest of the way to the chair.
The door opened again, followed by a chorus of "Good morning, Commander Ikari!" from the bridge crew. Shinji walked in, unobstrusive and humble as ever, and waved good morning back to them. He noticed Misato beckoning him, so he sauntered over to her chair. When he got there, he was surprised by the look of frustration in her eyes.
"You had better keep your 'friend' under better control, Shinji." she said darkly.
"Who, Max? Why? What did he do this time?"
"He PURRS every time I walk by him, or he walks by me! It's driving me crazy!"
Misato stopped and glared at Shinji, who was obviously trying to hold back laughter.
"I sorry." he appologised, still not doing a good job of containing his mirth. "I don't think that he can help it. It's a natural reaction, as far as he's concerned. Maybe if you let him rub against your leg..."
"Shut your face!" Misato snapped. "And get out of my sight!"
Her mood wasn't improved by the fact that the rest of the bridge crew was immersed in a deep course of instrument study, trying desperately to give the impression that they hadn't heard the conversation. Growling, she spoke up.
"Alright. How long until we reach our destination and I can throw this stray cat off my ship?"
Madison attempted to reply with a straight face, but failed miserably.
"A-about two hours, M-m-major... snrkff."
The young lady quickly hid her face, hoping that the intemperate Major wouldn't include her in her ire.
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Later, when they had reached their destination, the landing boat set out, loaded with things like solar-powered generators and other technical gadgets. Max was trying to concentrate on anything except the water whipping around them, so he decided to talk to the pilot, Li.
"So, what do you guys do with all this stuff?"
The young man looked up from his controls for a minute.
"What? Oh, the products. Well, we need raw resources to keep our operation going, so we use some of those raw materials to manufacture finished goods, which we then barter back to locals in exchange for what we need.
"Neat." Max said, admiring the ingenuity of it. He looked around the boat, but couldn't see either Shinji or Major Katsuragi anywhere. "Hey, I don't see either of the commanders. Where are they?"
Was it just him, or did Li seem a little uncomfortable about that? But the pilot answered in a casual tone.
"Oh, they just had some more pressing business to attend to on the ship. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to concentrate on piloting this boat."
The conversation obviously over, Max sat down and pondered what he had pieced together in the last week of knowing the crew of the Yggdrasil. They were far too militarily organized to be simple ship-borne peddlers, and their submarine was like nothing that Max had ever heard of. On top of that, what was the son of the man who had caused the Third Impact doing traipsing across the seas? Something wasn't quite right here, but Max's instincts told him that he would find out soon enough. Whatever their secret was, it was far too big for them to be able to hide it from him for long.
Max trusted his instincts. Ever since the Third Impact, a couple of years ago, they had tended to be right almost all the time.
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"Okay, the landing boat is away safely. What's our status?" Shinji said.
They were inside the command centre of the Yggdrasil, the entire bridge crew there, plus a boy and two girls that looked to be the same age as Shinji.
"Well, Commander," Madison answered, bringing up a large map of the area on the display. "about half an hour ago, our surface radar picked up a large group of super-mutants, roaming around the mountain area. We estimate that they will come across the town within a couple of hours."
"We will be launching all four EVA's." Misato spoke up. "Now, with the exception of Shinji and Touji, none of you have ever actually piloted an EVA before, so this mission is going to be a sort of basic training for you. None of the targets has an AT Field, so this should be relatively easy for you."
"You'll be launching from the Catapult, so you're going to be on battery power." Madison added. "Even with the shoulder packs, you're going to only have three minutes at maximum fighting level, so you'll have to make it quick."
"What if we run out of power?" one of the girls asked.
"In that case, Hikari," Shinji replied. "I'll finish the job off single-handedly. Any more questions?" There weren't any. "Good. Now, Touji will be piloting EVA-03, Hikari will pilot EVA-02, and Jen gets EVA-00. Move out, pilots!"
As they ran off to their EVA's, Misato shook her head.
"It's so different than it was with NERV."
"Tell me about it." Madison agreed.
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Max was having a good time in the town's bar. It was a lot better than the one in his former home, so he was busy experimenting with all-new sorts of alchohol. For the sake of keeping a low profile, he had his tail tucked into his pants, but he was having a good time nonetheless.
The bartender glanced at the clock on the wall and sighed.
"Almost time for Langley to come in."
"Langley?" Max was curious.
"Yeah," the bartender replied. "our best engineer. Knows more than any of the others, but is almost impossible to deal with. Tough as a club with nails in it."
"Ouch. And this Langley always comes in at this time?"
"Almost religiously." the bartender assured him.
The doors opened not very long after, and the bartender said grimly,
"Here's Langley."
Max looked over for his shoulder, uncomprehending. All that stood in the doorway was a girl, maybe seventeen or eighteen, with bright red hair. Then it penetrated his alcohol-befuddled brain that this was the feared Langley. He nearly fell off his chair laughing.
"This... is the... terrible... Langley?" he gasped between bursts of laughter.
The redhead's eyes narrowed, and she marched over to where he sat. The next thing Max knew, he was lying on the floor with a terrible pain in the side of his head that wasn't alcohol-related.
"Idiot." she said loudly. "You deserve much worse." She turned to the bartender. "Where'd this asshole come from anyway?"
The bartender had seen the roundhouse kick that had sent Max flying, and he gulped. Whenever Langley was in a bad mood, she tended to take it out on everybody. Actually, come to think of it, she took everything out on everyone.
"He came with the traders." the bartender said timidly, handing over her favourite drink. The bartender too had once been on the wrong end of the temperamental girl's wrath, and it had taken several weeks for all of the injuries to heal.
"You mean the guys with the high-tech stuff?" Langley asked. The bartender nodded in reply. Langley smiled at that. "Yeah, I think that I'll go have a look at what they've got after I'm done here.
"You sure? We don't need any outsiders' stuff here."
"What do you mean?" Langley snorted derisively. "We may be lucky and still have some operating technology, but we need more if we're ever going to make this town into half the place it was before the Third Impact."
Any further debate was cut off when a man ran into the bar, screaming at the top of his lungs.
"Super-mutants!" he cried. "God help us, it's a whole pack of super-mutants!"
Instantly, Langley was out the door and running for the observation tower. She quickly scurried up the ladder and grabbed the binoculars from the hands of the lookout.
Scanning the mountains, she indeed found the pack with ease. She swore under her breath, the town had nothing to defend itself against monsters this size. Maybe, if they were lucky, the traders had something, but Langley personally doubted it.
She suddenly realized that the man she had clobbered in the bar was standing next to her. She wondered momentarily how he had got up here so fast, but that thought was swept away by the ton of other concerns that were foremost on her mind at the moment.
"I wonder if they knew about this." the stranger said to himself.
What the hell does that mean? Langley wondered, but her thoughts were interrupted when the ground trembled under a mighty crash. That came from the direction of the sea! she realized.
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Shinji was the first to be launched from the Catapult, a variant of the launch elevators of the old NERV centre. Instead of firing the EVA vertically however, the Catapult launched them horizontally. It was the Yggdrasil's solution for the need to get EVA's to a battle area quickly.
Behind him, EVA's 03, 02, and 00 landed in succession. They all held a pallet gun in one hand, just as EVA-01 did, but Shinji also held a spear in his other hand. Shinji dropped his EVA to a crouch, then sprinted off in the direction of the super-mutant pack. The others followed him closely.
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"It's a second group of super-mutants!" the lookout cried, looking through another pair of binoculars. "And they're closing fast!"
Langley, however, was just staring through her binoculars.
"No..." she said softly, unbelieving. "It can't be..."
In the enhanced vision of the binoculars, she saw the sleek armoured forms slide onto one knee and bring up their large rifles.
"But..." she protested once again.
Max didn't have a pair of goggles, although with his keen vision he could just barely make out the forms of the second group. He was wondering what the girl was blabbering about, when suddenly a large amount of tracer fire erupted from the distant figures and crashed into the first group of super-mutants.
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Shinji's rifle clicked empty at the same time as everyone else's, so he simply discarded it and hefted his spear.
"All EVA's, discard pallet guns and follow me. Prepare for close combat." he ordered.
They complied, and once again the EVA's set off at a break-neck pace, racing towards their targets. The giant super-mutants, long the bane of post-Third Impact civilization, had actually come quite close to the town before the sudden rifle volley stopped them in their tracks.
EVA-01 let out a terrible war-cry as it threw its spear at one super-mutant. The force of the impact impaled the mutant and sent it flying, spraying blood as it went.
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"Holy shit!" Max yelped as he saw the purple beast throw a huge spear through one of the giants. "What the hell are those things?"
Before their eyes, and the eyes of the whole town, the four EVA's proceeded to cut into their enemies with prog knives, sending blood spraying all over the rocky countryside each time they scored a hit.
"They're Evangelions..." Langley answered him, almost in a daze.
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Hikari was knocked back, her EVA falling against a cliff face. In front of her, the super-mutant that had knocked her back raised its hand to deliver another blow to her EVA. Hikari crossed her arms in front of her face to ward off the attack.
But the attack never came. EVA-01 appeared out of nowhere and sliced half the creature's forearm off, before grabbing the mutant's neck in its other hand and driving it into the cliff next to EVA-02. As it collapsed to its knees, Shinji slashed it deeply in the back, sending blood spraying over both the EVA's as the super-mutant's back split open.
Although drenched in blood, EVA-01 didn't dawdle, but quickly moved on to another part of the battlefield. After a moment's hesitation over the grisly remains of the mutant, Hikari did likewise.
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In the Yggdrasil's command room, the bridge crew watched the progress of the battle. For their first sortie, the girls were actually doing pretty well.
"What are the pilots' sync ratios?" Misato asked.
"Pilots Bui and *Hikari* are operating at sixty-four and sixty-eight percent synchronization, respectively." Madison reported.
"Not bad, but it could be better." Misato mused. "How about Shinji and Touji?"
"Well, pilot Suzihara is currently at eight-five percent sync, and pilot Ikari is at one hundred and twenty-six percent."
"Good. How are they doing for power?"
"Ummm..."
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Langley stared at the purple giant as it wreaked havoc on its foes.
"Shinji..." she whispered.
Max's keen ears however, heard her soft tone.
"Shinji?" he asked her. "As in Shinji Ikari?"
The mention of EVA-01's pilot's full name seemed to bring Langley out of her daze. Her head whipped around and she glared at Max.
"How do you know Shinji?" she demanded.
"I only just met him last week..." Max started to explain, but was cut off mercilessly.
"YOU MEAN YOU KNEW SHINJI AND YOU DIDN'T SAY ANYTHING TO ME?" Langley screamed at him. "I SHOULD GUT YOU ALIVE FOR THIS!"
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Jen Bui was in the middle of grappling one of the few remaining mutants when suddenly her cockpit flashed red. She looked at the power countdown and was horrified to find it under ten seconds and closing fast on zero.
"NO!!!" she screamed in frustration.
But it was no good, and everything went dark as power failed on all systems. Fortunately, the life-support had a backup, so she wouldn't suffocate, but she might well be ripped apart by an irate mutant.
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"Power has failed on all EVA's except Unit 01!" Madison reported.
"You're on you're own now, Shinji." Misato said into the comm.
"Understood." Shinji's face winked back at her from the comm screen before disappearing.
"What? This can't be!" Madison said in disbelief.
"What is it?" Misato asked, concerned.
"Unit 01's sync ratio is rising rapidly! No, it's stabilizing at two hundred and forty-seven percent!"
"He just doubled his sync ratio," Misato chuckled, "what a guy."
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A pair of compartments opened up on EVA-01's hips, and Shinji withdrew a pistol from each of them. Without bothering to pause to aim, he blasted away at the mutants crowding the recumbant forms of his comrades. The mutants realized that one of the EVA's was still a threat, but by that time there were only a handfull of them left.
Discarding the empty pistols, Shinji drew his spare prog knife and leapt into the fray. As he viciously kicked and slashed his way through them, EVA-01 and the surrounding mountains and cliffs became more and more coated with blood. Pausing momentarily, the EVA reared back its head and let out another terrible screech. And then it was right back to the business of slaughtering the super-mutants.
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"You mean Shiji's in that... monster?" Max asked incredulously.
"Of course dumb-head! Who else do you think is piloting it!" Langley snapped at him.
"It doesn't look like anyone sane's piloting it..." he said, eyeing the frenzied way it tore apart its enemies.
"That's because you're stupid!"
As they watched on, EVA-01 picked up one mutant by the head, and then drove it into the ground, crushing the skull and sending brains flying in all directions. Another mutant tried to take advantage of EVA-01's distraction and jump it while it crouched over the body that it had just killed, but the unicorned head snapped up and glared at it. Then, without any warning, the super-mutant simply ripped in half, the two halves landing quite some distance from each other.
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"What the hell? He's manipulating the AT Field!"
"Calm down, Madison." Misato said, although she was privately a little astonished herself. "He's done that same move before."
She didn't mention that he had done it while at a sync ratio of over 400%, and that he hadn't really done it but rather the awakened beast that was EVA-01 had been responsible. She didn't mention any of the circumstances of that incident because, quite frankly, the bridge crew had enough to worry about as it was.
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Suddenly Shinji found himself down to the last mutant. It was actually hugely obese, and he had never seen its like before. But that didn't really matter, because it was going to be dead within a matter of seconds anyway. Before his enemy could react, Shinji cut a deep gash into its chest with his prog knife, then reached in with his other hand and ripped out the thing's heart.
He was quite surprised when the thing then picked up EVA-01 and whipped it into a nearby cliff face. As he got back to his feet, he wondered aloud,
"What the hell? Didn't I just rip out its heart?"
"Shinji!" Misato's voice rang over the comm. "That thing probably has two hearts. You'll need to destroy the other one to kill it."
"Just great." Shinji muttered. "Any idea where it is?"
"Uhhh, no."
"Even better." Shinji grumbled, cutting the connection.
He realised that he had lost his second knife when he took his impromptu flight, so he gritted his teeth and started forward anyway.
"I guess that I'll have to do this the old-fashioned way."
EVA-01 was about sixty meters away from the fat mutant when suddenly the latter's arms shot out, stretching remarkably, and attempted to slam the EVA down. However, just before they reached the purple-armoured beast, they ran into an octagonal field and bounced away harmlessly.
Shinji waited until the fat mutant had withdrawn its arms before making his own move. Sprinting forward suddenly, he grabbed the creature's upper left arm in one hand and its neck in the other. As it flailed helplessly beneath him, he squeezed and pulled with both arms. A sickening tearing sound announced the removal of the arm from its socket. Still holding onto the mutant's neck, EVA-01 swung the arm around...
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To top off the whole gory spectacle of the battle, the town's residents watched as EVA-01 tore the arm off its one remaining enemy and proceeded to use it to bludgeon the creature's head. The mutant's remaining arm flailed and spasmed with each blow, until finally its death throes waned and it only shuddered slightly each time the EVA landed a blow.
After a while, EVA-01 stood up and dropped its makeshift weapon next to the body that it had originally come from. The townsfolk could see that only a pulpy mass, akin to a huge deflated football, remained of the head. The formerly slab grey mountains to the north of the village were covered in great smears of crimson, and small rivers of blood had formed, draining away the vast quantities of blood from the battlefield.
"Well, that was just about the grossest thing that I've ever seen." Max said.
Langly, however, just watched the tall form of EVA-01, its armour now more red than purple. After a minute, she turned to Max.
"Guess what? Today's your lucky day, you get to take me to meet Shinji and whoever else he's hanging around with nowadays."
"And what if I don't?" Max sneered at her.
A moment later, when Langley's eyes narrowed and she glared at him evilly, he wished he hadn't said that.
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"Battle complete. All targets eliminated." Shinji reported.
"Well done, Shinji! We'll send out the recovery teams now, so just sit tight for a bit." Misato beamed at him.
Shinji nodded and closed the link. Misato next turned to Madison.
"Dispatch the recovery teams. Tell them to also bring in the fat mutant and one of the regular super-mutants that didn't face EVA-01. We'll freeze them, and then let Ritsuko and her goons have a look at them later."
"Alright. But, why one of the ones that was defeated by one of the other EVA's?"
Misato laughed at her subordinate's confusion.
"Because there will be more of it left to study, that's why. I don't know if you noticed or not, but EVA-01 tends to shred its enemies."
Madison chuckled back at that and nodded in understanding. Satisfied, Misato turned to other matters.
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"Look, there's the landing boat. Now, can you let go of my..."
"No!"
"Aiiie! Don't do that!"
"Then shut up, stupid!"
The landing boat was almost fully loaded when Li looked up at the two forms that were approaching. One was the outgoing Max Kleitel, obviously in a lot of discomfort, and behind him walked a red-haired young lady with a very determined cast to her face. The girl looked oddly familiar, and it took him a minute to remember where he had seen her before.
"Alright, get this crate moving!" the girl was demanding.
"Pilot Langley?" Li asked. "Is that you, Asuka Soryu Langley?"
"I don't know about the first two names, but the last one fits. Aaarrrgh!" Max snorted, ending in a strangled cry.
"Of course it's me." Asuka said. "Who else would it be?"
"Well, I-, uh-, um-." Li stammered. He had forgotten what an overwhelming person she could be. "It's just that, ever since you disappeared in the Third Impact, we didn't know if you were alive or not, so it's kind of a shock to see you here."
"Well, get over it! I'm here, now get moving already!"
"Can you let go of my tail yet?" Max whined.
"No! Shut up!"
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Shinji was standing with the other pilots, watching the recovery teams fly the forms of two mutants back to the hold of the Yggdrasil, when he heard a familiar demanding voice behind him.
"Alright, where's that Dumkopf?"
"He's right over there. Look, you don't..."
"That's enough out of you! I see him."
Shinji turned around to see Max leading a beautiful redhead. The redhead's scowl was like a blast from the past to the lead EVA pilot.
"Asuka?" he asked softly.
"Shinji! I thought that I'd never see you again!"
She ran towards him, and he noticed how graceful she moved, even when her face was clouded with so much emotion. They drew near to each other...
... And then Asuka kicked him in the shin. Hard.
"Aaargh!" he cried, hopping up and down on one foot while clutching his injured leg.
"HOW COULD YOU LET SOMEONE PILOT MY UNIT 02?" Asuka screamed at him from point-blank range. "I OUGHT TO PUNCH YOUR SPLEEN OUT! WHO DID IT? WHEN I GET MY HANDS ON THEM I'LL MAKE ANYTHING I DO TO YOU SEEM LIKE A CHRISTMAS VACATION! Oh, hi Hikari!"
"Umm, hi Asuka." Hikari responded nervously, fingering the cuffs of her plug suit and thankful that it was the uniform white for female pilots, not the red of the EVA that she had just piloted. "Look Asuka, I..."
"One minute Hikari. I've got some business to finish with this Sheisskopf here first."
"Ergh." Shinji grunted. "Will you listen to the girl?"
"Shut up, stupid!"
"I piloted EVA-02, Asuka." Hikari said, trying to get it over with as quickly as possible.
Asuka glared at her old friend for a mimute, then shrugged.
"At least it was one of my friends. I can live with that. Had it been one of your fellow stooges..." she finished menacingly.
The mental image of Kensuke begging him before the battle to be allowed to pilot EVA-02 suddenly didn't make Shinji feel so guilty about refusing his friend's request.
"Alright, everyone is dismissed." Shinji announced to the pilots. "You all did very well. Remember that the debriefing is in an hour and a half."
After they had all wandered off, Asuka and Hikari talking like the blazes in an attempt catch up on the last two years, Shinji hobbled over to where Max stood massaging some life back into his much-abused tail.
"Is she always like this?" the blond-haired man moaned.
"Only when she's around me or one of my friends."
"And how often is that?"
"We used to be in the same class. Actually, we used to live together."
"Ahhh. I see. Hard feelings, eh?"
"What? No! No, it wasn't anything like that. We just used to have the same guardian, so we lived in the same appartment. In fact, I used to know every time she was changing because she would yell at me not to look."
They both shared a laugh at that. Then an idea struck Shinji. He grinned at Max.
"You know what would make the pain go away faster?"
"Do tell."
"Raiding Misato's liquor stash."
"Won't she kill us for that?"
"Only if one us blabbers. Come on, let's go!"
"I'm with you all the way!"
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End of Epsiode 2
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Comments and suggestions are welcome.
ragnar_murray@hotmail.com
Warnings: Well, although there wasn't any actual sexual innuendo in the last episode, it was more of a general warning of what was to come. Starting with this episode. Oh, and there'll be the standard violence and language, too. If you have a problem with either of those, then I'd like to know how you made it past the first fight scene in the last episode.
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The New World
Episode 2
Max Kleitel stretched and yawned happily. He felt a little claustrophobic inside the Yggdrasil's halls, but there were more than enough perks to living in the giant submarine to make up for that slight discomfort.
Besides which, he knew that it was just a residual attitude implanted in him during the changes that the Third Impact wrought upon his body. While he had always been athletic, he had never been able to jump three times his height effortlessly. Of course, the cat part in him also brought along its fair share of phobias, such as his current claustrophobia, or his fear of water.
He sighed at that. He had been one of the lucky ones. At least the Third Impact had affected him beneficially, for the most part. Many others had become misshapen mutants or even worse, had been killed outright. Of course, there were rumours that a very few people had been turned into supermen by the Third Impact. He had discounted those rumours until about a week ago, when he met Shinji Ikari.
The two of them had fought bitterly, Max as a giant tiger, and Shinji with his bare hands. Shinji wasn't a superman, Max knew from personal experience, but he was definitely more than just human. No one should have walked out alive, let alone victorious, out of an encounter with a weretiger.
Eventually, he reached his destination, the Yggdrasil's command centre. It was early morning, before either of the ship's commanders usually came in, so he was often able to learn more from the bridge crew then than he would normally.
He entered stealthily, sliding unnoticed over to a position right next to the door, and proceeded to watch the bridge crew's actions. His long and bushy tail swished lightly back and forth as he stood there. That's one of the perks of this place, he thought, they can design clothes to accomodate the most unusual things. He no longer had to stuff the damn thing into his pants uncomfortably, instead, it just stuck out of a specially designed hole in the seat of his pants.
It wasn't long before Major Katsuragi came in. Taking one sweeping look at the bridge, she noticed him standing off to the side and sniffed derisively. As she made her way past him to her command chair, he made a soft sound deep in his throat that caused her to stiffen, then stomp the rest of the way to the chair.
The door opened again, followed by a chorus of "Good morning, Commander Ikari!" from the bridge crew. Shinji walked in, unobstrusive and humble as ever, and waved good morning back to them. He noticed Misato beckoning him, so he sauntered over to her chair. When he got there, he was surprised by the look of frustration in her eyes.
"You had better keep your 'friend' under better control, Shinji." she said darkly.
"Who, Max? Why? What did he do this time?"
"He PURRS every time I walk by him, or he walks by me! It's driving me crazy!"
Misato stopped and glared at Shinji, who was obviously trying to hold back laughter.
"I sorry." he appologised, still not doing a good job of containing his mirth. "I don't think that he can help it. It's a natural reaction, as far as he's concerned. Maybe if you let him rub against your leg..."
"Shut your face!" Misato snapped. "And get out of my sight!"
Her mood wasn't improved by the fact that the rest of the bridge crew was immersed in a deep course of instrument study, trying desperately to give the impression that they hadn't heard the conversation. Growling, she spoke up.
"Alright. How long until we reach our destination and I can throw this stray cat off my ship?"
Madison attempted to reply with a straight face, but failed miserably.
"A-about two hours, M-m-major... snrkff."
The young lady quickly hid her face, hoping that the intemperate Major wouldn't include her in her ire.
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Later, when they had reached their destination, the landing boat set out, loaded with things like solar-powered generators and other technical gadgets. Max was trying to concentrate on anything except the water whipping around them, so he decided to talk to the pilot, Li.
"So, what do you guys do with all this stuff?"
The young man looked up from his controls for a minute.
"What? Oh, the products. Well, we need raw resources to keep our operation going, so we use some of those raw materials to manufacture finished goods, which we then barter back to locals in exchange for what we need.
"Neat." Max said, admiring the ingenuity of it. He looked around the boat, but couldn't see either Shinji or Major Katsuragi anywhere. "Hey, I don't see either of the commanders. Where are they?"
Was it just him, or did Li seem a little uncomfortable about that? But the pilot answered in a casual tone.
"Oh, they just had some more pressing business to attend to on the ship. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to concentrate on piloting this boat."
The conversation obviously over, Max sat down and pondered what he had pieced together in the last week of knowing the crew of the Yggdrasil. They were far too militarily organized to be simple ship-borne peddlers, and their submarine was like nothing that Max had ever heard of. On top of that, what was the son of the man who had caused the Third Impact doing traipsing across the seas? Something wasn't quite right here, but Max's instincts told him that he would find out soon enough. Whatever their secret was, it was far too big for them to be able to hide it from him for long.
Max trusted his instincts. Ever since the Third Impact, a couple of years ago, they had tended to be right almost all the time.
****************************************************************************
"Okay, the landing boat is away safely. What's our status?" Shinji said.
They were inside the command centre of the Yggdrasil, the entire bridge crew there, plus a boy and two girls that looked to be the same age as Shinji.
"Well, Commander," Madison answered, bringing up a large map of the area on the display. "about half an hour ago, our surface radar picked up a large group of super-mutants, roaming around the mountain area. We estimate that they will come across the town within a couple of hours."
"We will be launching all four EVA's." Misato spoke up. "Now, with the exception of Shinji and Touji, none of you have ever actually piloted an EVA before, so this mission is going to be a sort of basic training for you. None of the targets has an AT Field, so this should be relatively easy for you."
"You'll be launching from the Catapult, so you're going to be on battery power." Madison added. "Even with the shoulder packs, you're going to only have three minutes at maximum fighting level, so you'll have to make it quick."
"What if we run out of power?" one of the girls asked.
"In that case, Hikari," Shinji replied. "I'll finish the job off single-handedly. Any more questions?" There weren't any. "Good. Now, Touji will be piloting EVA-03, Hikari will pilot EVA-02, and Jen gets EVA-00. Move out, pilots!"
As they ran off to their EVA's, Misato shook her head.
"It's so different than it was with NERV."
"Tell me about it." Madison agreed.
****************************************************************************
Max was having a good time in the town's bar. It was a lot better than the one in his former home, so he was busy experimenting with all-new sorts of alchohol. For the sake of keeping a low profile, he had his tail tucked into his pants, but he was having a good time nonetheless.
The bartender glanced at the clock on the wall and sighed.
"Almost time for Langley to come in."
"Langley?" Max was curious.
"Yeah," the bartender replied. "our best engineer. Knows more than any of the others, but is almost impossible to deal with. Tough as a club with nails in it."
"Ouch. And this Langley always comes in at this time?"
"Almost religiously." the bartender assured him.
The doors opened not very long after, and the bartender said grimly,
"Here's Langley."
Max looked over for his shoulder, uncomprehending. All that stood in the doorway was a girl, maybe seventeen or eighteen, with bright red hair. Then it penetrated his alcohol-befuddled brain that this was the feared Langley. He nearly fell off his chair laughing.
"This... is the... terrible... Langley?" he gasped between bursts of laughter.
The redhead's eyes narrowed, and she marched over to where he sat. The next thing Max knew, he was lying on the floor with a terrible pain in the side of his head that wasn't alcohol-related.
"Idiot." she said loudly. "You deserve much worse." She turned to the bartender. "Where'd this asshole come from anyway?"
The bartender had seen the roundhouse kick that had sent Max flying, and he gulped. Whenever Langley was in a bad mood, she tended to take it out on everybody. Actually, come to think of it, she took everything out on everyone.
"He came with the traders." the bartender said timidly, handing over her favourite drink. The bartender too had once been on the wrong end of the temperamental girl's wrath, and it had taken several weeks for all of the injuries to heal.
"You mean the guys with the high-tech stuff?" Langley asked. The bartender nodded in reply. Langley smiled at that. "Yeah, I think that I'll go have a look at what they've got after I'm done here.
"You sure? We don't need any outsiders' stuff here."
"What do you mean?" Langley snorted derisively. "We may be lucky and still have some operating technology, but we need more if we're ever going to make this town into half the place it was before the Third Impact."
Any further debate was cut off when a man ran into the bar, screaming at the top of his lungs.
"Super-mutants!" he cried. "God help us, it's a whole pack of super-mutants!"
Instantly, Langley was out the door and running for the observation tower. She quickly scurried up the ladder and grabbed the binoculars from the hands of the lookout.
Scanning the mountains, she indeed found the pack with ease. She swore under her breath, the town had nothing to defend itself against monsters this size. Maybe, if they were lucky, the traders had something, but Langley personally doubted it.
She suddenly realized that the man she had clobbered in the bar was standing next to her. She wondered momentarily how he had got up here so fast, but that thought was swept away by the ton of other concerns that were foremost on her mind at the moment.
"I wonder if they knew about this." the stranger said to himself.
What the hell does that mean? Langley wondered, but her thoughts were interrupted when the ground trembled under a mighty crash. That came from the direction of the sea! she realized.
****************************************************************************
Shinji was the first to be launched from the Catapult, a variant of the launch elevators of the old NERV centre. Instead of firing the EVA vertically however, the Catapult launched them horizontally. It was the Yggdrasil's solution for the need to get EVA's to a battle area quickly.
Behind him, EVA's 03, 02, and 00 landed in succession. They all held a pallet gun in one hand, just as EVA-01 did, but Shinji also held a spear in his other hand. Shinji dropped his EVA to a crouch, then sprinted off in the direction of the super-mutant pack. The others followed him closely.
****************************************************************************
"It's a second group of super-mutants!" the lookout cried, looking through another pair of binoculars. "And they're closing fast!"
Langley, however, was just staring through her binoculars.
"No..." she said softly, unbelieving. "It can't be..."
In the enhanced vision of the binoculars, she saw the sleek armoured forms slide onto one knee and bring up their large rifles.
"But..." she protested once again.
Max didn't have a pair of goggles, although with his keen vision he could just barely make out the forms of the second group. He was wondering what the girl was blabbering about, when suddenly a large amount of tracer fire erupted from the distant figures and crashed into the first group of super-mutants.
****************************************************************************
Shinji's rifle clicked empty at the same time as everyone else's, so he simply discarded it and hefted his spear.
"All EVA's, discard pallet guns and follow me. Prepare for close combat." he ordered.
They complied, and once again the EVA's set off at a break-neck pace, racing towards their targets. The giant super-mutants, long the bane of post-Third Impact civilization, had actually come quite close to the town before the sudden rifle volley stopped them in their tracks.
EVA-01 let out a terrible war-cry as it threw its spear at one super-mutant. The force of the impact impaled the mutant and sent it flying, spraying blood as it went.
****************************************************************************
"Holy shit!" Max yelped as he saw the purple beast throw a huge spear through one of the giants. "What the hell are those things?"
Before their eyes, and the eyes of the whole town, the four EVA's proceeded to cut into their enemies with prog knives, sending blood spraying all over the rocky countryside each time they scored a hit.
"They're Evangelions..." Langley answered him, almost in a daze.
****************************************************************************
Hikari was knocked back, her EVA falling against a cliff face. In front of her, the super-mutant that had knocked her back raised its hand to deliver another blow to her EVA. Hikari crossed her arms in front of her face to ward off the attack.
But the attack never came. EVA-01 appeared out of nowhere and sliced half the creature's forearm off, before grabbing the mutant's neck in its other hand and driving it into the cliff next to EVA-02. As it collapsed to its knees, Shinji slashed it deeply in the back, sending blood spraying over both the EVA's as the super-mutant's back split open.
Although drenched in blood, EVA-01 didn't dawdle, but quickly moved on to another part of the battlefield. After a moment's hesitation over the grisly remains of the mutant, Hikari did likewise.
****************************************************************************
In the Yggdrasil's command room, the bridge crew watched the progress of the battle. For their first sortie, the girls were actually doing pretty well.
"What are the pilots' sync ratios?" Misato asked.
"Pilots Bui and *Hikari* are operating at sixty-four and sixty-eight percent synchronization, respectively." Madison reported.
"Not bad, but it could be better." Misato mused. "How about Shinji and Touji?"
"Well, pilot Suzihara is currently at eight-five percent sync, and pilot Ikari is at one hundred and twenty-six percent."
"Good. How are they doing for power?"
"Ummm..."
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Langley stared at the purple giant as it wreaked havoc on its foes.
"Shinji..." she whispered.
Max's keen ears however, heard her soft tone.
"Shinji?" he asked her. "As in Shinji Ikari?"
The mention of EVA-01's pilot's full name seemed to bring Langley out of her daze. Her head whipped around and she glared at Max.
"How do you know Shinji?" she demanded.
"I only just met him last week..." Max started to explain, but was cut off mercilessly.
"YOU MEAN YOU KNEW SHINJI AND YOU DIDN'T SAY ANYTHING TO ME?" Langley screamed at him. "I SHOULD GUT YOU ALIVE FOR THIS!"
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Jen Bui was in the middle of grappling one of the few remaining mutants when suddenly her cockpit flashed red. She looked at the power countdown and was horrified to find it under ten seconds and closing fast on zero.
"NO!!!" she screamed in frustration.
But it was no good, and everything went dark as power failed on all systems. Fortunately, the life-support had a backup, so she wouldn't suffocate, but she might well be ripped apart by an irate mutant.
****************************************************************************
"Power has failed on all EVA's except Unit 01!" Madison reported.
"You're on you're own now, Shinji." Misato said into the comm.
"Understood." Shinji's face winked back at her from the comm screen before disappearing.
"What? This can't be!" Madison said in disbelief.
"What is it?" Misato asked, concerned.
"Unit 01's sync ratio is rising rapidly! No, it's stabilizing at two hundred and forty-seven percent!"
"He just doubled his sync ratio," Misato chuckled, "what a guy."
****************************************************************************
A pair of compartments opened up on EVA-01's hips, and Shinji withdrew a pistol from each of them. Without bothering to pause to aim, he blasted away at the mutants crowding the recumbant forms of his comrades. The mutants realized that one of the EVA's was still a threat, but by that time there were only a handfull of them left.
Discarding the empty pistols, Shinji drew his spare prog knife and leapt into the fray. As he viciously kicked and slashed his way through them, EVA-01 and the surrounding mountains and cliffs became more and more coated with blood. Pausing momentarily, the EVA reared back its head and let out another terrible screech. And then it was right back to the business of slaughtering the super-mutants.
****************************************************************************
"You mean Shiji's in that... monster?" Max asked incredulously.
"Of course dumb-head! Who else do you think is piloting it!" Langley snapped at him.
"It doesn't look like anyone sane's piloting it..." he said, eyeing the frenzied way it tore apart its enemies.
"That's because you're stupid!"
As they watched on, EVA-01 picked up one mutant by the head, and then drove it into the ground, crushing the skull and sending brains flying in all directions. Another mutant tried to take advantage of EVA-01's distraction and jump it while it crouched over the body that it had just killed, but the unicorned head snapped up and glared at it. Then, without any warning, the super-mutant simply ripped in half, the two halves landing quite some distance from each other.
****************************************************************************
"What the hell? He's manipulating the AT Field!"
"Calm down, Madison." Misato said, although she was privately a little astonished herself. "He's done that same move before."
She didn't mention that he had done it while at a sync ratio of over 400%, and that he hadn't really done it but rather the awakened beast that was EVA-01 had been responsible. She didn't mention any of the circumstances of that incident because, quite frankly, the bridge crew had enough to worry about as it was.
****************************************************************************
Suddenly Shinji found himself down to the last mutant. It was actually hugely obese, and he had never seen its like before. But that didn't really matter, because it was going to be dead within a matter of seconds anyway. Before his enemy could react, Shinji cut a deep gash into its chest with his prog knife, then reached in with his other hand and ripped out the thing's heart.
He was quite surprised when the thing then picked up EVA-01 and whipped it into a nearby cliff face. As he got back to his feet, he wondered aloud,
"What the hell? Didn't I just rip out its heart?"
"Shinji!" Misato's voice rang over the comm. "That thing probably has two hearts. You'll need to destroy the other one to kill it."
"Just great." Shinji muttered. "Any idea where it is?"
"Uhhh, no."
"Even better." Shinji grumbled, cutting the connection.
He realised that he had lost his second knife when he took his impromptu flight, so he gritted his teeth and started forward anyway.
"I guess that I'll have to do this the old-fashioned way."
EVA-01 was about sixty meters away from the fat mutant when suddenly the latter's arms shot out, stretching remarkably, and attempted to slam the EVA down. However, just before they reached the purple-armoured beast, they ran into an octagonal field and bounced away harmlessly.
Shinji waited until the fat mutant had withdrawn its arms before making his own move. Sprinting forward suddenly, he grabbed the creature's upper left arm in one hand and its neck in the other. As it flailed helplessly beneath him, he squeezed and pulled with both arms. A sickening tearing sound announced the removal of the arm from its socket. Still holding onto the mutant's neck, EVA-01 swung the arm around...
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To top off the whole gory spectacle of the battle, the town's residents watched as EVA-01 tore the arm off its one remaining enemy and proceeded to use it to bludgeon the creature's head. The mutant's remaining arm flailed and spasmed with each blow, until finally its death throes waned and it only shuddered slightly each time the EVA landed a blow.
After a while, EVA-01 stood up and dropped its makeshift weapon next to the body that it had originally come from. The townsfolk could see that only a pulpy mass, akin to a huge deflated football, remained of the head. The formerly slab grey mountains to the north of the village were covered in great smears of crimson, and small rivers of blood had formed, draining away the vast quantities of blood from the battlefield.
"Well, that was just about the grossest thing that I've ever seen." Max said.
Langly, however, just watched the tall form of EVA-01, its armour now more red than purple. After a minute, she turned to Max.
"Guess what? Today's your lucky day, you get to take me to meet Shinji and whoever else he's hanging around with nowadays."
"And what if I don't?" Max sneered at her.
A moment later, when Langley's eyes narrowed and she glared at him evilly, he wished he hadn't said that.
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"Battle complete. All targets eliminated." Shinji reported.
"Well done, Shinji! We'll send out the recovery teams now, so just sit tight for a bit." Misato beamed at him.
Shinji nodded and closed the link. Misato next turned to Madison.
"Dispatch the recovery teams. Tell them to also bring in the fat mutant and one of the regular super-mutants that didn't face EVA-01. We'll freeze them, and then let Ritsuko and her goons have a look at them later."
"Alright. But, why one of the ones that was defeated by one of the other EVA's?"
Misato laughed at her subordinate's confusion.
"Because there will be more of it left to study, that's why. I don't know if you noticed or not, but EVA-01 tends to shred its enemies."
Madison chuckled back at that and nodded in understanding. Satisfied, Misato turned to other matters.
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"Look, there's the landing boat. Now, can you let go of my..."
"No!"
"Aiiie! Don't do that!"
"Then shut up, stupid!"
The landing boat was almost fully loaded when Li looked up at the two forms that were approaching. One was the outgoing Max Kleitel, obviously in a lot of discomfort, and behind him walked a red-haired young lady with a very determined cast to her face. The girl looked oddly familiar, and it took him a minute to remember where he had seen her before.
"Alright, get this crate moving!" the girl was demanding.
"Pilot Langley?" Li asked. "Is that you, Asuka Soryu Langley?"
"I don't know about the first two names, but the last one fits. Aaarrrgh!" Max snorted, ending in a strangled cry.
"Of course it's me." Asuka said. "Who else would it be?"
"Well, I-, uh-, um-." Li stammered. He had forgotten what an overwhelming person she could be. "It's just that, ever since you disappeared in the Third Impact, we didn't know if you were alive or not, so it's kind of a shock to see you here."
"Well, get over it! I'm here, now get moving already!"
"Can you let go of my tail yet?" Max whined.
"No! Shut up!"
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Shinji was standing with the other pilots, watching the recovery teams fly the forms of two mutants back to the hold of the Yggdrasil, when he heard a familiar demanding voice behind him.
"Alright, where's that Dumkopf?"
"He's right over there. Look, you don't..."
"That's enough out of you! I see him."
Shinji turned around to see Max leading a beautiful redhead. The redhead's scowl was like a blast from the past to the lead EVA pilot.
"Asuka?" he asked softly.
"Shinji! I thought that I'd never see you again!"
She ran towards him, and he noticed how graceful she moved, even when her face was clouded with so much emotion. They drew near to each other...
... And then Asuka kicked him in the shin. Hard.
"Aaargh!" he cried, hopping up and down on one foot while clutching his injured leg.
"HOW COULD YOU LET SOMEONE PILOT MY UNIT 02?" Asuka screamed at him from point-blank range. "I OUGHT TO PUNCH YOUR SPLEEN OUT! WHO DID IT? WHEN I GET MY HANDS ON THEM I'LL MAKE ANYTHING I DO TO YOU SEEM LIKE A CHRISTMAS VACATION! Oh, hi Hikari!"
"Umm, hi Asuka." Hikari responded nervously, fingering the cuffs of her plug suit and thankful that it was the uniform white for female pilots, not the red of the EVA that she had just piloted. "Look Asuka, I..."
"One minute Hikari. I've got some business to finish with this Sheisskopf here first."
"Ergh." Shinji grunted. "Will you listen to the girl?"
"Shut up, stupid!"
"I piloted EVA-02, Asuka." Hikari said, trying to get it over with as quickly as possible.
Asuka glared at her old friend for a mimute, then shrugged.
"At least it was one of my friends. I can live with that. Had it been one of your fellow stooges..." she finished menacingly.
The mental image of Kensuke begging him before the battle to be allowed to pilot EVA-02 suddenly didn't make Shinji feel so guilty about refusing his friend's request.
"Alright, everyone is dismissed." Shinji announced to the pilots. "You all did very well. Remember that the debriefing is in an hour and a half."
After they had all wandered off, Asuka and Hikari talking like the blazes in an attempt catch up on the last two years, Shinji hobbled over to where Max stood massaging some life back into his much-abused tail.
"Is she always like this?" the blond-haired man moaned.
"Only when she's around me or one of my friends."
"And how often is that?"
"We used to be in the same class. Actually, we used to live together."
"Ahhh. I see. Hard feelings, eh?"
"What? No! No, it wasn't anything like that. We just used to have the same guardian, so we lived in the same appartment. In fact, I used to know every time she was changing because she would yell at me not to look."
They both shared a laugh at that. Then an idea struck Shinji. He grinned at Max.
"You know what would make the pain go away faster?"
"Do tell."
"Raiding Misato's liquor stash."
"Won't she kill us for that?"
"Only if one us blabbers. Come on, let's go!"
"I'm with you all the way!"
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End of Epsiode 2
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Comments and suggestions are welcome.
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