Disclaimers: More rhetorical questions. In the (unlikely) event of anyone with a legal claim to Evangelion reading this, and (even more unlikely) they decide to sue me for writing it, what are the odds that I'll have the money to pay even their legal fees, let alone any damages?
Warnings: Blood! Blood splatterd against the wall! Swearing! More swearing than a death metal band on tour! Sexual Innuendo! Enough sexual innuendo to make a certain recent President blush! I think that that about sums up what's to be afraid of this time around.
****************************************************************************
The New World
Episode 3
The Instrumentality of Man.
The Next Step in Human Evolution.
The Joining of an Angel with the Mother of Humanity, Lilim.
The Third Impact.
****************************************************************************
SEELE, the hidden council, conceived of the Third Impact as a way for man to overcome its current stagnation. They were convinced that the Third Impact would mean the unification of all human souls into one perfect being.
They were wrong.
****************************************************************************
The masses of humanity believed the Third Impact would be a repeat of the Second Impact, only on a far more catastrophic level. This time, none of the race of Man would survive the terrible holocaust.
They too were wrong.
****************************************************************************
Gendo Ikari, a renegade member of SEELE, believed that he could manipulate the Third Impact to allow him to rejoin his dead wife. He beleived that he could achieve that goal by twisting SEELE's plans and initiating the Third Impact on his own terms.
He was right.
But that is irrelevant.
****************************************************************************
Like an otherworldly lawn mower, the Third Impact sucked up mankind and spat it back out in pieces. Some people did experience some sort of evolution, but nothing like SEELE had expected. Many were completely unaffected by the Third Impact, something for which they would never realize how lucky they were. Some people were thrown to the other side of the world than they had come from. Others became mutants, forced to live the rest of their lives in horribly twisted bodies, wandering the Earth until they were granted the merciful release of Death. Many did not emerge from the Third Impact at all.
Whatever the individual results, civilization, already weakened by the Second Impact, was brought to its knees. Many technological devices had been destroyed by the etheral disturbances that were the side product of the Third Impact. Governments and countries collapsed as their people were unable to readjust to normal life.
The Third Era of Man is an Era of chaos. As various forces try to put the world back together again after the devastation of the Third Impact, they are bound to come into conflict with one another over the eventual course of humanity. These conflicts will only further weaken the race of Man as it totters on the edge of oblivion.
On the lips of every survivor is the name of the last universal villain: Gendo Ikari, the thrice-damned. Blamed by those who yet live for their misery, Ikari has taken a place in common thought patterns alongside Satan, Hitler, and Stalin.
It is against this backdrop that the remnants of NERV gather to atone for their part in the implementation of the Third Impact...
****************************************************************************
"Asuka, have you seen my hard lemonade laying around anywhere?" Misato asked.
"No. You probably got drunk and finished it all off and don't remember a thing about it."
"Yeah, I guess so. All the same, I could have sworn it was here yesterday."
The two were sharing one of the rooms in the Yggdrasil's sleeping quarters. All the rooms were identical, with two beds in each of them, but normally Misato and Shinji were given their own rooms. Lately however, they had each been forced to take a roommate until the sleeping arrangents could be properly sorted out.
It had been Asuka's first night sleeping in a decent bed instead of on a wooden slab and a run-down mattress. She was, therefore, in a good mood. Adding to her good mood was the fact that she had immediately put that Dumkopf of a Third Child in his place as soon as she saw him yesterday.
Misato resigned herself to the loss of her hard lemonade and opened up a tallboy. Watching her friend's morning ritual, another part of the old morning ritual came to mind.
"Hey, where do we get food around here? Does Shinji cook it for us?" she asked Misato hopefully.
"No such luck. While on the Yggdrasil we have to suffer through cafeteria food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner."
Asuka pouted briefly, then her hunger won out and she got dressed enough to make it down to the cafeteria. She was about to go out when Misato called to her.
"Oh, Asuka! Before you go, can you wake Shinji up? I usually do it myself, but I'm running a little behind today."
Asuka sniffed in contempt, but headed next door and rang the buzzer until a bleary-eyed Shinji finally opened the door.
"Alright already, 'm up Misa-" he paused as he realized who was facing him. "Oh, g'morning, Asuka. You didn't have to ring the buzzer so much, y'know."
Asuka took one look at him and slapped him.
"You should dress more decently if you're going to answer your door to a woman!"
And with that, she stomped off towards the cafeteria, leaving Shinji standing in the doorway, wearing only his boxers. Misato sauntered out of her door and smiled at him.
"Good morning." she said brightly. She indicated the rapidly reddning mark on his face. "I see that Asuka already got you up."
"You knew she was going to do that." he accused.
"What can I say? She's got a point, you should dress more decently. Besides which, I had to get you back for humiliating me in front of the entire bridge yesterday."
And with that, she too wandered off in the direction of the cafeteria. Shinji waited until he was sure she was out of sight, the he went back inside.
"Are they gone yet?" Max asked. "And what happened to your face?"
"Shut up and help me get rid of these bottles."
****************************************************************************
It was about half an hour later that Shinji finally made it into the combined bridge/command centre of the Yggdrasil. As usual, everyone let out their usual chorus of "Good morning, Commander Ikari!". He waved back at them, then made his way over to Misato.
"So, what's my schedule today?"
"Let's see here..." Misato said, flicking through the computerized organizer. "You've got a pilot's meeting at 9:00. And then, right after that, we're going to run sync tests on all the pilots who participated in the battle yesterday, plus Asuka and minus yourself. Then, you get to command the ship for a bit in the afternoon while I take a break."
"Yeah, I know all about your 'breaks'." Shinji muttered.
"And what's that supposed to mean?" Misato demanded.
"It means that you usually get sloshed and I end up having to take care of the ship for the rest of the day. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a pilot's meeting to attend."
And with that, he beat a hasty retreat before she could find a suitably nasty rejoinder. On his way out, he whispered something in Max's ear, which set the man chuckling.
"Alright," she demanded after the doors had closed behind Shinji, "what did he say?"
****************************************************************************
Asuka was sitting next to Hikari in the Yggdrasil's pilot lounge, talking away the time until the meeting started. She had to admit, the lounge was very nice. It was a pity they hadn't had anywhere like this back when they were with NERV. She noticed that the twenty or so kids that also occupied the room were all from her old A-2 class, but she didn't think much of that, she was far too bored right now.
"Hey, what's holding up the meeting?" Asuka asked her friend impatiently.
"We're waiting for the lead pilot to get here." Hikari replied. "Oh, wait, here he is!"
Asuka looked up in time to see Shinji walk through the doors and head for the front of the room.
"You mean SHINJI is the lead pilot?" she gasped incredulously.
"Of course. He's been the only one here who ever fought against the Angels, and the next most experienced pilot is Touji, so there's not much in the way of choice."
"Harumph! I leave for a couple of years, and look what happens! Pathetic."
Hikari supressed a giggle at her friend's predictable reaction. But before she could add anything, Shinji called everyone's attention to the front of the room.
"Alright, let's get this underway." he said. "Yesterday was the first full sortie of the entire EVA group. This meeting is to answer any questions or concerns that any of you might have developped, whether you piloted yesterday or not. Okay, open forum."
One of the girls near the back put her hand up. Shinji saw it and nodded to her.
"During the fight, most of the EVA's ran out of power. Will that happen every time?"
"Good question, Estella." Shinji smiled benevolently. "Now, while most of the EVA's did run out of power before the end of this last fight, that was to be expected given the size of the enemy force. We just couldn't be expected to defeat them all before our batteries ran out. For this fight we were also testing out the Catapult, so we had to operate solely on internal and external batteries, but if we go into a planned battle we will most likely deploy from VTOL craft, with mobile generators."
He shrugged helplessly.
"What I mean to say is that it's unusual for us to run out of power in the middle of a fight. It shouldn't be a concern normally. Does that answer your question?"
Estella nodded. Next, one of the boys put up his hand. Shinji saw him and grinned.
"Yes, Kensuke?"
"About the hip-holsters of Unit 01, how come the rest of the EVA's don't have them?"
"The hip-holsters, as you call them, are still in the testing phase. We're not sure if they're worth the trouble for most of the EVA's because a battle will either be too short for us to need backup weapons, or we'll have armoury support, so for now only EVA-01 will be outfitted with them, until we're convinced that they're feasible for use on the other EVA's. Any other questions? Go ahead Crystal..."
As the meeting dragged on, Asuka barely managed to keep her cool. All the questions that everyone was asking were so stupid! And Shinji's answers were all too predictable. Finally though, it seemed that people ran out of subjects to quiz their lead pilot on, and Shinji was able to draw the meeting to a close.
"Oh, and one last thing." he said before they left. "EVA-02 is being withdrawn from the regular roster rotation and assigned to pilot Langley. I'm sorry, but you'll just have to suffer through the decreased rotation. And I'll need pilots Bui, Horaki, Langley, and Suzihara to report to the harmonics test room in five minutes for a Level Three sync test."
There was a bit of grumbling at that, and Asuka recieved a couple of baleful glares, but generally people seemed to accept the news. Asuka caught Shinji before he left.
"I'm glad you've found your brains again." she said. "You shouldn't have even considered letting anyone else pilot it in the first place."
Shinji simply chuckled.
"Whatever. You just get the test results to back me up, or I'll get lynched by the rest of them."
"And it would serve you right. I'll show you, with the test..." she trailed off, her brow furrowed in concentration. "Did you say Level Three?" Shinji nodded. "You peverted Sheisskopf! I should string you out by your guts!"
Hikari was slightly confused by this.
"What's a Level Three test?" she asked Asuka.
Shinji took advantage of the distraction to get out of the lounge before the tempestuous redhead could carry out her threat. Glaring at his retreating back, Asuka simply said.
"You'll find out soon enough. And then you'll agree with me."
****************************************************************************
"You can't be serious! SHINJI IKARI, WHEN I GET MY HANDS ON YOU I'LL..."
Hikari's screams and threats weren't the only ones, just the loudest.
"Perversling! Baka Hentai! Dumkopf!"
"Wow, talk about bilingual!" Max said admiringly.
"Ikari, when I get out of here I'm going to tell Asuka just how close you came to letting Kensuke pilot EVA-02!"
"WHAT?"
"Oh great," Shinji muttered, burying his face in his hands. "I'm in for it now."
"What kind of a sick joke is this, Shinji?"
On the video monitor the bridge crew could see a bare white hall with five cubicles at the end. One of the cubicles stood empty, but the other four had their screen half-doors closed, covering the between the neck and the knees of each cubicle's occupant. It was still obvious though, from the vague and blurry skin-coloured forms visible through the screens, that all four pilots were stark naked.
"Look, all of you, just listen to me!" Shinji said finally in exasperation. "We want to test your sync ratios without the interference of your plug suits. Asuka, Rei, and I had to do this more times than I could count when we worked for NERV, so I don't see what the Second Child is complaining about. Besides which, Misato's going to deactivate the camera just like she always did. Now, get marching!"
He cut the connection and turned expectantly to Misato as the four figures on the screen started to walk forward.
"Uhhh," he said after a while, trying his best not to glance at the screen. "Misato? Aren't you going to turn off the camera?"
The entire bridge crew just laughed at that.
"Actually, no." Misato chuckled. "That was always just our little joke."
"You mean you never turned off the camera?"
"Nope, COMMANDER Ikari." Madison giggled lewdly.
Shinji balled up his fists in an attempt to contain his embarassment.
"Then why the hell have I bothered to wear clothes for the last three years?" he said through gritted teeth.
As everyone erupted into laughter, Asuka's face appeared on the comm-link.
"Hey! How come the high and mighty Shinji Ikari doesn't have to run one of these tests?"
"Because we already know more than enough about Shinji." Misato said, grinning wickedly.
"And what's that supposed to mean?" Asuka asked shortly as more laughter came from the bridge crew.
"Enough!" Shinji said crossly. "Fine, Asuka! I'll take the test!" He glared at everyone in the bridge. "What's one test more?"
"Good, I'll be expecting you down here shortly!" Asuka said before disconnecting, completely oblivious to the true reason that Shinji was so angry.
Misato's laughter was cut short when Shinji's shirt hit her in the face. Pulling the garment off her head, she looked incredulously at the enraged youth.
"You're taking your clothes off here?"
His glare hit her like a blast from the positron rifle.
"I thought I'd take them off on the way. Save time and effort all round, you know?"
And with that he stalked off, leaving the bridge crew unsure as to whether he was going to head for his EVA and get his revenge upon them, or to the test area. A moment later, everyone let out a collective sigh of relief as his naked form walked down the access corridor to the test plugs.
"Looks like he's still mad at us." Madison reported.
"I know, he's giving us BOTH fingers." Misato agreed. Into the mike, she said. "Shinji, we've prepped Tube 5 with the data from Unit 01."
They didn't recieve any sort of answer, but Shinji nonetheless made his way towards the designated tube.
"Simulating nerve connections." Madison said after he got inside. "Artificial Borderline reached. Displaying pilot's sync ratio."
On the screen, in the bottom corner of Shinji's image, appeared a rapidly rising counter. As the entire crew watched, it went from 1 to 10 in a matter of a couple of seconds.
"What! That's not possible!" Asuka complained as it passed twenty. "Our sync ratios can't rise that fast in the simulations!"
"At least, they're not supposed to." Misato breathed while the counter went over thirty.
"Ummm." Max spoke up. "I'm new at this, but isn't it a good sign that Shinji's ratio is going up so fast?"
"No." Misato answered. "Look at everyone else's counters. They've been connected for three times as long as Shinji, and Touji and Asuka are still in the low twenties, Jen and Hikari aren't even that high, and Shinji's already past fifty!"
"Wow! He must be really mad!"
"Tell me about it."
"Sync ratio in Tube 5 at eighty percent!" Madison reported incredulously.
"That does it!" Asuka snapped. "Stop showing off, Dumkopf! I've only just met you again, and I'm already fed up with your antics!"
"Oh, sorry Asuka." Shinji said, calming down slightly. "But Mis..."
"I DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT!" The redhead screamed over the comm. "DON'T APOLOGIZE, JUST STOP!"
"Ummm... Okay... Sorry..."
"I don't believe it." Madison whispered, looking at one set of readouts. "His sync ratio is holding at ninety-two percent."
"And he's not even anywhere close to his limit." Misato agreed, eyeing another screen. "Without the protection of his plug suit, that's amazing."
"But Asuka's sync ratio is starting to pick up the pace."
"Let's just sit back and watch, shall we."
"It was THAT that got me angry in the first place." Shinji said from the comfort of his tube.
Shinji and Touji were busy showering themselves off in the guys changing room after the test when the alarm klaxons started blaring.
"No rest for the wicked." Touji said, rolling his eyes.
Shinji didn't reply, he was already busy throwing on his plug suit. How does he get that thing on so fast? Touji wondered. I guess that it's just a lot of practice. Before Touji was even half done with his suit, Shinji was out of the door.
****************************************************************************
"Status?" Shinji demanded as he entered the bridge.
"Large acquatic life-form detected. Pattern: Red. It's an unknown mutant type."
Shinji grinned.
"Perfect. Equip EVA's 01 and 02 with C-class weaponry, and attach a reinforced lifeline to EVA-02."
"You're going for an underwater sortie?" Misato asked.
"No, Asuka is. I'll stay abovedecks and provide support if neccessary. After all, she's the champion swimmer, isn't she?"
****************************************************************************
"Hmpf. At least Shinji had the sense to let me engage the enemy. That Dumkopf couldn't even swim in NERV's pool."
Before her stood the red form of EVA-02. Technical crews were busy strapping what looked to be a rack of (relatively) short spears to the EVA's left thigh. As she watched them work, Shinji came up behind her.
"They're harpoons." he explained.
"I knew that, Dumkopf!" she sniffed, unwilling to admit that she had been somewhat mystified.
"Of course." Shinji said, trying to hold back a smile and failing. "Silly me. Well, the work crews are almost done. Shall we get going?"
"Why wouldn't we?"
****************************************************************************
A short while later, the pair of EVA's stood on the Yggdrasil's hull, weapons at hand. Both Shinji and Asuka had harpoon guns and spears, although Shinji's spear looked a lot fancier. Asuka was about to comment on this when Misato's voice rang out over the comm.
"Here it comes! Unit 02, move out!"
"Right-O!" Asuka shouted happily. It felt good to be back at the controls of EVA-02, like this was some crucial part of her that she had missed for the last few years. "That mutant isn't going to know what hit him!"
As she dived over the edge, Shinji didn't even bother to try and hide his smile this time.
Underwater, Asuka found that she had dropped nearly on top of the mutant. Her sudden appearance caused it to turn towards her instinctively, and it started to charge her with its maw wide open. It looked vaguely like a Manta Ray, Asuka reflected as she pulled the trigger on her harpoon gun. The small projectile flew towards the oblivious mutant, and lodged itself in the thing's left fin.
Maddened now, the mutant rushed at EVA-02, but the lithe EVA darted out of the way at the last second and shoved its spear into the mutant's back. As it came around for another pass, trailing thick clouds of blood wherever it went, Asuka reloaded her harpoon gun and fired another shot into the brute's body. She was starting to wonder at the use of it, because each hit didn't seem to affect the big mutant other than make it angrier.
She darted out of the way again, but this time its mouth closed on the power and lifeline cables. Realizing that it was about to try and drag her through the water, she ejected the cables in a fit of swearing. While it was still occupied with the cables, she put another harpoon into its back. The mutant realized that it no longer held its prey and released the cables, swimming far out from the Yggdrasil. Asuka thought that it might finally be running away until she saw it turn.
"It's going to try and build up speed!" she said breathlessly. "I won't be able to outrun it."
"Then get up here!" Shinji said.
As EVA-02 scrambled up the side of the Yggdrasil's hull, the mutant realized where she was going and altered its course slightly. It burst out of the water and hurtled towards where it expected the annoying pest to be, only to see the red EVA sprawled at the feet of a purple one.
Shinji's spear was no ordinary weapon. He had designed it personally, with some help from Ritsuko, and was quite proud of it. At a mental command, the large tip split apart and formed itself into three large progressive blades, equidistant from each other around the shaft. When the large form of the mutant burst from the water, he braced himself for the impact.
Asuka looked up in time to see the mutant fall upon Shinji's odd spear. The force of the impact knocked Shinji backwards, but somehow he maintained both his upright position and his grip on the spear. With a mighty roar, EVA-01 levered the mutant right over its head and sent it crashing into the water, where it floated lifelessly. As Shinji withdrew the spear, Asuka could see what appeared to be the mutant's heart still trapped between the blades.
"There." Shinji said triumphantly. "That wasn't so hard now, was it."
"Ummm." Asuka said softly. "Shinji, you're... standing on..."
As she trailed off, Shinji realized what was bothering her. The impact with the mutant had knocked EVA-01 off the Yggdrasil's hull, and it now stood on the water's surface. Before anyone in the bridge could clue in, Shinji shuffled over slightly so that he was standing on the floating corpse of the mutant.
"Good battle Asuka." he said hurriedly. "We'll talk about this later. For now, deactivate so that the retrieval units can get you."
****************************************************************************
About half an hour later Asuka finally managed to corner Shinji. The fact that he was in the guy's changing room didn't deter her. He was half-out of his plug suit when the vision in red entered the room.
"Uh, hi Asuka." he said, trying not to blush while pulling the suit back up a little. "Look, can this wait until later?"
"What are you, stupid? Do you think that I'm going to let you run away without explaining to me just what the hell you were doing?"
"Er, when?"
"Don't play dumb with me! How come your EVA didn't sink when it got knocked onto the water?"
Shinji was about to bury his face in his hands when he realize that to do so would mean letting go of the suit, and the last thing he needed right now was to be berated on his indecent lack of clothing, despite the fact that it was HIS changing room.
"Okay, I'll tell you, but only if you promise not to tell any of the others. And that includes Misato, Hikari, whoever."
Asuka put her hands on her hips and glared at him.
"What is this, some big secret?"
"Do you want to know or not?"
"Alright. I promise not to tell anyone whatever stupid trick you're up to."
"Good enough. What I did is called "skimming". If you remember, a lot of the angels used to be able to walk on water or just float throught the air. That's what I was doing, although I'm not very good at it, I'm not able to float through the air yet."
"Very well then, I won't tell anyone on one condition."
"WHAT? You already said you weren't going to tell anyone!" Shinji exploded.
Asuka merely gave him an ineffable smile, and waited for him to give in, which he did shortly.
"Fine. What's the condition?"
"That you teach me how to do that."
Of all the possible responses that Asuka had been expecting, the one that she had least been expecting was the one that Shinji gave. He just sat there, with his head hung low, and chuckled.
"Well, is that your answer?" Asuka demanded.
"If that's all you want," Shinji chuckled, "then I'd be glad to teach you."
Asuka grinned triumphantly and swept out of the room. As soon as she was gone, Shinji stood, still chuckling slightly.
"I'm still only beginning to understand, Kaorou." he said to no-one in particular. "And now I'm expected to help her? What a wonderful sense of irony God has."
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End of Epsiode 3
****************************************************************************
Comments and suggestions are welcome.
ragnar_murray@hotmail.com
Warnings: Blood! Blood splatterd against the wall! Swearing! More swearing than a death metal band on tour! Sexual Innuendo! Enough sexual innuendo to make a certain recent President blush! I think that that about sums up what's to be afraid of this time around.
****************************************************************************
The New World
Episode 3
The Instrumentality of Man.
The Next Step in Human Evolution.
The Joining of an Angel with the Mother of Humanity, Lilim.
The Third Impact.
****************************************************************************
SEELE, the hidden council, conceived of the Third Impact as a way for man to overcome its current stagnation. They were convinced that the Third Impact would mean the unification of all human souls into one perfect being.
They were wrong.
****************************************************************************
The masses of humanity believed the Third Impact would be a repeat of the Second Impact, only on a far more catastrophic level. This time, none of the race of Man would survive the terrible holocaust.
They too were wrong.
****************************************************************************
Gendo Ikari, a renegade member of SEELE, believed that he could manipulate the Third Impact to allow him to rejoin his dead wife. He beleived that he could achieve that goal by twisting SEELE's plans and initiating the Third Impact on his own terms.
He was right.
But that is irrelevant.
****************************************************************************
Like an otherworldly lawn mower, the Third Impact sucked up mankind and spat it back out in pieces. Some people did experience some sort of evolution, but nothing like SEELE had expected. Many were completely unaffected by the Third Impact, something for which they would never realize how lucky they were. Some people were thrown to the other side of the world than they had come from. Others became mutants, forced to live the rest of their lives in horribly twisted bodies, wandering the Earth until they were granted the merciful release of Death. Many did not emerge from the Third Impact at all.
Whatever the individual results, civilization, already weakened by the Second Impact, was brought to its knees. Many technological devices had been destroyed by the etheral disturbances that were the side product of the Third Impact. Governments and countries collapsed as their people were unable to readjust to normal life.
The Third Era of Man is an Era of chaos. As various forces try to put the world back together again after the devastation of the Third Impact, they are bound to come into conflict with one another over the eventual course of humanity. These conflicts will only further weaken the race of Man as it totters on the edge of oblivion.
On the lips of every survivor is the name of the last universal villain: Gendo Ikari, the thrice-damned. Blamed by those who yet live for their misery, Ikari has taken a place in common thought patterns alongside Satan, Hitler, and Stalin.
It is against this backdrop that the remnants of NERV gather to atone for their part in the implementation of the Third Impact...
****************************************************************************
"Asuka, have you seen my hard lemonade laying around anywhere?" Misato asked.
"No. You probably got drunk and finished it all off and don't remember a thing about it."
"Yeah, I guess so. All the same, I could have sworn it was here yesterday."
The two were sharing one of the rooms in the Yggdrasil's sleeping quarters. All the rooms were identical, with two beds in each of them, but normally Misato and Shinji were given their own rooms. Lately however, they had each been forced to take a roommate until the sleeping arrangents could be properly sorted out.
It had been Asuka's first night sleeping in a decent bed instead of on a wooden slab and a run-down mattress. She was, therefore, in a good mood. Adding to her good mood was the fact that she had immediately put that Dumkopf of a Third Child in his place as soon as she saw him yesterday.
Misato resigned herself to the loss of her hard lemonade and opened up a tallboy. Watching her friend's morning ritual, another part of the old morning ritual came to mind.
"Hey, where do we get food around here? Does Shinji cook it for us?" she asked Misato hopefully.
"No such luck. While on the Yggdrasil we have to suffer through cafeteria food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner."
Asuka pouted briefly, then her hunger won out and she got dressed enough to make it down to the cafeteria. She was about to go out when Misato called to her.
"Oh, Asuka! Before you go, can you wake Shinji up? I usually do it myself, but I'm running a little behind today."
Asuka sniffed in contempt, but headed next door and rang the buzzer until a bleary-eyed Shinji finally opened the door.
"Alright already, 'm up Misa-" he paused as he realized who was facing him. "Oh, g'morning, Asuka. You didn't have to ring the buzzer so much, y'know."
Asuka took one look at him and slapped him.
"You should dress more decently if you're going to answer your door to a woman!"
And with that, she stomped off towards the cafeteria, leaving Shinji standing in the doorway, wearing only his boxers. Misato sauntered out of her door and smiled at him.
"Good morning." she said brightly. She indicated the rapidly reddning mark on his face. "I see that Asuka already got you up."
"You knew she was going to do that." he accused.
"What can I say? She's got a point, you should dress more decently. Besides which, I had to get you back for humiliating me in front of the entire bridge yesterday."
And with that, she too wandered off in the direction of the cafeteria. Shinji waited until he was sure she was out of sight, the he went back inside.
"Are they gone yet?" Max asked. "And what happened to your face?"
"Shut up and help me get rid of these bottles."
****************************************************************************
It was about half an hour later that Shinji finally made it into the combined bridge/command centre of the Yggdrasil. As usual, everyone let out their usual chorus of "Good morning, Commander Ikari!". He waved back at them, then made his way over to Misato.
"So, what's my schedule today?"
"Let's see here..." Misato said, flicking through the computerized organizer. "You've got a pilot's meeting at 9:00. And then, right after that, we're going to run sync tests on all the pilots who participated in the battle yesterday, plus Asuka and minus yourself. Then, you get to command the ship for a bit in the afternoon while I take a break."
"Yeah, I know all about your 'breaks'." Shinji muttered.
"And what's that supposed to mean?" Misato demanded.
"It means that you usually get sloshed and I end up having to take care of the ship for the rest of the day. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a pilot's meeting to attend."
And with that, he beat a hasty retreat before she could find a suitably nasty rejoinder. On his way out, he whispered something in Max's ear, which set the man chuckling.
"Alright," she demanded after the doors had closed behind Shinji, "what did he say?"
****************************************************************************
Asuka was sitting next to Hikari in the Yggdrasil's pilot lounge, talking away the time until the meeting started. She had to admit, the lounge was very nice. It was a pity they hadn't had anywhere like this back when they were with NERV. She noticed that the twenty or so kids that also occupied the room were all from her old A-2 class, but she didn't think much of that, she was far too bored right now.
"Hey, what's holding up the meeting?" Asuka asked her friend impatiently.
"We're waiting for the lead pilot to get here." Hikari replied. "Oh, wait, here he is!"
Asuka looked up in time to see Shinji walk through the doors and head for the front of the room.
"You mean SHINJI is the lead pilot?" she gasped incredulously.
"Of course. He's been the only one here who ever fought against the Angels, and the next most experienced pilot is Touji, so there's not much in the way of choice."
"Harumph! I leave for a couple of years, and look what happens! Pathetic."
Hikari supressed a giggle at her friend's predictable reaction. But before she could add anything, Shinji called everyone's attention to the front of the room.
"Alright, let's get this underway." he said. "Yesterday was the first full sortie of the entire EVA group. This meeting is to answer any questions or concerns that any of you might have developped, whether you piloted yesterday or not. Okay, open forum."
One of the girls near the back put her hand up. Shinji saw it and nodded to her.
"During the fight, most of the EVA's ran out of power. Will that happen every time?"
"Good question, Estella." Shinji smiled benevolently. "Now, while most of the EVA's did run out of power before the end of this last fight, that was to be expected given the size of the enemy force. We just couldn't be expected to defeat them all before our batteries ran out. For this fight we were also testing out the Catapult, so we had to operate solely on internal and external batteries, but if we go into a planned battle we will most likely deploy from VTOL craft, with mobile generators."
He shrugged helplessly.
"What I mean to say is that it's unusual for us to run out of power in the middle of a fight. It shouldn't be a concern normally. Does that answer your question?"
Estella nodded. Next, one of the boys put up his hand. Shinji saw him and grinned.
"Yes, Kensuke?"
"About the hip-holsters of Unit 01, how come the rest of the EVA's don't have them?"
"The hip-holsters, as you call them, are still in the testing phase. We're not sure if they're worth the trouble for most of the EVA's because a battle will either be too short for us to need backup weapons, or we'll have armoury support, so for now only EVA-01 will be outfitted with them, until we're convinced that they're feasible for use on the other EVA's. Any other questions? Go ahead Crystal..."
As the meeting dragged on, Asuka barely managed to keep her cool. All the questions that everyone was asking were so stupid! And Shinji's answers were all too predictable. Finally though, it seemed that people ran out of subjects to quiz their lead pilot on, and Shinji was able to draw the meeting to a close.
"Oh, and one last thing." he said before they left. "EVA-02 is being withdrawn from the regular roster rotation and assigned to pilot Langley. I'm sorry, but you'll just have to suffer through the decreased rotation. And I'll need pilots Bui, Horaki, Langley, and Suzihara to report to the harmonics test room in five minutes for a Level Three sync test."
There was a bit of grumbling at that, and Asuka recieved a couple of baleful glares, but generally people seemed to accept the news. Asuka caught Shinji before he left.
"I'm glad you've found your brains again." she said. "You shouldn't have even considered letting anyone else pilot it in the first place."
Shinji simply chuckled.
"Whatever. You just get the test results to back me up, or I'll get lynched by the rest of them."
"And it would serve you right. I'll show you, with the test..." she trailed off, her brow furrowed in concentration. "Did you say Level Three?" Shinji nodded. "You peverted Sheisskopf! I should string you out by your guts!"
Hikari was slightly confused by this.
"What's a Level Three test?" she asked Asuka.
Shinji took advantage of the distraction to get out of the lounge before the tempestuous redhead could carry out her threat. Glaring at his retreating back, Asuka simply said.
"You'll find out soon enough. And then you'll agree with me."
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"You can't be serious! SHINJI IKARI, WHEN I GET MY HANDS ON YOU I'LL..."
Hikari's screams and threats weren't the only ones, just the loudest.
"Perversling! Baka Hentai! Dumkopf!"
"Wow, talk about bilingual!" Max said admiringly.
"Ikari, when I get out of here I'm going to tell Asuka just how close you came to letting Kensuke pilot EVA-02!"
"WHAT?"
"Oh great," Shinji muttered, burying his face in his hands. "I'm in for it now."
"What kind of a sick joke is this, Shinji?"
On the video monitor the bridge crew could see a bare white hall with five cubicles at the end. One of the cubicles stood empty, but the other four had their screen half-doors closed, covering the between the neck and the knees of each cubicle's occupant. It was still obvious though, from the vague and blurry skin-coloured forms visible through the screens, that all four pilots were stark naked.
"Look, all of you, just listen to me!" Shinji said finally in exasperation. "We want to test your sync ratios without the interference of your plug suits. Asuka, Rei, and I had to do this more times than I could count when we worked for NERV, so I don't see what the Second Child is complaining about. Besides which, Misato's going to deactivate the camera just like she always did. Now, get marching!"
He cut the connection and turned expectantly to Misato as the four figures on the screen started to walk forward.
"Uhhh," he said after a while, trying his best not to glance at the screen. "Misato? Aren't you going to turn off the camera?"
The entire bridge crew just laughed at that.
"Actually, no." Misato chuckled. "That was always just our little joke."
"You mean you never turned off the camera?"
"Nope, COMMANDER Ikari." Madison giggled lewdly.
Shinji balled up his fists in an attempt to contain his embarassment.
"Then why the hell have I bothered to wear clothes for the last three years?" he said through gritted teeth.
As everyone erupted into laughter, Asuka's face appeared on the comm-link.
"Hey! How come the high and mighty Shinji Ikari doesn't have to run one of these tests?"
"Because we already know more than enough about Shinji." Misato said, grinning wickedly.
"And what's that supposed to mean?" Asuka asked shortly as more laughter came from the bridge crew.
"Enough!" Shinji said crossly. "Fine, Asuka! I'll take the test!" He glared at everyone in the bridge. "What's one test more?"
"Good, I'll be expecting you down here shortly!" Asuka said before disconnecting, completely oblivious to the true reason that Shinji was so angry.
Misato's laughter was cut short when Shinji's shirt hit her in the face. Pulling the garment off her head, she looked incredulously at the enraged youth.
"You're taking your clothes off here?"
His glare hit her like a blast from the positron rifle.
"I thought I'd take them off on the way. Save time and effort all round, you know?"
And with that he stalked off, leaving the bridge crew unsure as to whether he was going to head for his EVA and get his revenge upon them, or to the test area. A moment later, everyone let out a collective sigh of relief as his naked form walked down the access corridor to the test plugs.
"Looks like he's still mad at us." Madison reported.
"I know, he's giving us BOTH fingers." Misato agreed. Into the mike, she said. "Shinji, we've prepped Tube 5 with the data from Unit 01."
They didn't recieve any sort of answer, but Shinji nonetheless made his way towards the designated tube.
"Simulating nerve connections." Madison said after he got inside. "Artificial Borderline reached. Displaying pilot's sync ratio."
On the screen, in the bottom corner of Shinji's image, appeared a rapidly rising counter. As the entire crew watched, it went from 1 to 10 in a matter of a couple of seconds.
"What! That's not possible!" Asuka complained as it passed twenty. "Our sync ratios can't rise that fast in the simulations!"
"At least, they're not supposed to." Misato breathed while the counter went over thirty.
"Ummm." Max spoke up. "I'm new at this, but isn't it a good sign that Shinji's ratio is going up so fast?"
"No." Misato answered. "Look at everyone else's counters. They've been connected for three times as long as Shinji, and Touji and Asuka are still in the low twenties, Jen and Hikari aren't even that high, and Shinji's already past fifty!"
"Wow! He must be really mad!"
"Tell me about it."
"Sync ratio in Tube 5 at eighty percent!" Madison reported incredulously.
"That does it!" Asuka snapped. "Stop showing off, Dumkopf! I've only just met you again, and I'm already fed up with your antics!"
"Oh, sorry Asuka." Shinji said, calming down slightly. "But Mis..."
"I DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT!" The redhead screamed over the comm. "DON'T APOLOGIZE, JUST STOP!"
"Ummm... Okay... Sorry..."
"I don't believe it." Madison whispered, looking at one set of readouts. "His sync ratio is holding at ninety-two percent."
"And he's not even anywhere close to his limit." Misato agreed, eyeing another screen. "Without the protection of his plug suit, that's amazing."
"But Asuka's sync ratio is starting to pick up the pace."
"Let's just sit back and watch, shall we."
"It was THAT that got me angry in the first place." Shinji said from the comfort of his tube.
Shinji and Touji were busy showering themselves off in the guys changing room after the test when the alarm klaxons started blaring.
"No rest for the wicked." Touji said, rolling his eyes.
Shinji didn't reply, he was already busy throwing on his plug suit. How does he get that thing on so fast? Touji wondered. I guess that it's just a lot of practice. Before Touji was even half done with his suit, Shinji was out of the door.
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"Status?" Shinji demanded as he entered the bridge.
"Large acquatic life-form detected. Pattern: Red. It's an unknown mutant type."
Shinji grinned.
"Perfect. Equip EVA's 01 and 02 with C-class weaponry, and attach a reinforced lifeline to EVA-02."
"You're going for an underwater sortie?" Misato asked.
"No, Asuka is. I'll stay abovedecks and provide support if neccessary. After all, she's the champion swimmer, isn't she?"
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"Hmpf. At least Shinji had the sense to let me engage the enemy. That Dumkopf couldn't even swim in NERV's pool."
Before her stood the red form of EVA-02. Technical crews were busy strapping what looked to be a rack of (relatively) short spears to the EVA's left thigh. As she watched them work, Shinji came up behind her.
"They're harpoons." he explained.
"I knew that, Dumkopf!" she sniffed, unwilling to admit that she had been somewhat mystified.
"Of course." Shinji said, trying to hold back a smile and failing. "Silly me. Well, the work crews are almost done. Shall we get going?"
"Why wouldn't we?"
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A short while later, the pair of EVA's stood on the Yggdrasil's hull, weapons at hand. Both Shinji and Asuka had harpoon guns and spears, although Shinji's spear looked a lot fancier. Asuka was about to comment on this when Misato's voice rang out over the comm.
"Here it comes! Unit 02, move out!"
"Right-O!" Asuka shouted happily. It felt good to be back at the controls of EVA-02, like this was some crucial part of her that she had missed for the last few years. "That mutant isn't going to know what hit him!"
As she dived over the edge, Shinji didn't even bother to try and hide his smile this time.
Underwater, Asuka found that she had dropped nearly on top of the mutant. Her sudden appearance caused it to turn towards her instinctively, and it started to charge her with its maw wide open. It looked vaguely like a Manta Ray, Asuka reflected as she pulled the trigger on her harpoon gun. The small projectile flew towards the oblivious mutant, and lodged itself in the thing's left fin.
Maddened now, the mutant rushed at EVA-02, but the lithe EVA darted out of the way at the last second and shoved its spear into the mutant's back. As it came around for another pass, trailing thick clouds of blood wherever it went, Asuka reloaded her harpoon gun and fired another shot into the brute's body. She was starting to wonder at the use of it, because each hit didn't seem to affect the big mutant other than make it angrier.
She darted out of the way again, but this time its mouth closed on the power and lifeline cables. Realizing that it was about to try and drag her through the water, she ejected the cables in a fit of swearing. While it was still occupied with the cables, she put another harpoon into its back. The mutant realized that it no longer held its prey and released the cables, swimming far out from the Yggdrasil. Asuka thought that it might finally be running away until she saw it turn.
"It's going to try and build up speed!" she said breathlessly. "I won't be able to outrun it."
"Then get up here!" Shinji said.
As EVA-02 scrambled up the side of the Yggdrasil's hull, the mutant realized where she was going and altered its course slightly. It burst out of the water and hurtled towards where it expected the annoying pest to be, only to see the red EVA sprawled at the feet of a purple one.
Shinji's spear was no ordinary weapon. He had designed it personally, with some help from Ritsuko, and was quite proud of it. At a mental command, the large tip split apart and formed itself into three large progressive blades, equidistant from each other around the shaft. When the large form of the mutant burst from the water, he braced himself for the impact.
Asuka looked up in time to see the mutant fall upon Shinji's odd spear. The force of the impact knocked Shinji backwards, but somehow he maintained both his upright position and his grip on the spear. With a mighty roar, EVA-01 levered the mutant right over its head and sent it crashing into the water, where it floated lifelessly. As Shinji withdrew the spear, Asuka could see what appeared to be the mutant's heart still trapped between the blades.
"There." Shinji said triumphantly. "That wasn't so hard now, was it."
"Ummm." Asuka said softly. "Shinji, you're... standing on..."
As she trailed off, Shinji realized what was bothering her. The impact with the mutant had knocked EVA-01 off the Yggdrasil's hull, and it now stood on the water's surface. Before anyone in the bridge could clue in, Shinji shuffled over slightly so that he was standing on the floating corpse of the mutant.
"Good battle Asuka." he said hurriedly. "We'll talk about this later. For now, deactivate so that the retrieval units can get you."
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About half an hour later Asuka finally managed to corner Shinji. The fact that he was in the guy's changing room didn't deter her. He was half-out of his plug suit when the vision in red entered the room.
"Uh, hi Asuka." he said, trying not to blush while pulling the suit back up a little. "Look, can this wait until later?"
"What are you, stupid? Do you think that I'm going to let you run away without explaining to me just what the hell you were doing?"
"Er, when?"
"Don't play dumb with me! How come your EVA didn't sink when it got knocked onto the water?"
Shinji was about to bury his face in his hands when he realize that to do so would mean letting go of the suit, and the last thing he needed right now was to be berated on his indecent lack of clothing, despite the fact that it was HIS changing room.
"Okay, I'll tell you, but only if you promise not to tell any of the others. And that includes Misato, Hikari, whoever."
Asuka put her hands on her hips and glared at him.
"What is this, some big secret?"
"Do you want to know or not?"
"Alright. I promise not to tell anyone whatever stupid trick you're up to."
"Good enough. What I did is called "skimming". If you remember, a lot of the angels used to be able to walk on water or just float throught the air. That's what I was doing, although I'm not very good at it, I'm not able to float through the air yet."
"Very well then, I won't tell anyone on one condition."
"WHAT? You already said you weren't going to tell anyone!" Shinji exploded.
Asuka merely gave him an ineffable smile, and waited for him to give in, which he did shortly.
"Fine. What's the condition?"
"That you teach me how to do that."
Of all the possible responses that Asuka had been expecting, the one that she had least been expecting was the one that Shinji gave. He just sat there, with his head hung low, and chuckled.
"Well, is that your answer?" Asuka demanded.
"If that's all you want," Shinji chuckled, "then I'd be glad to teach you."
Asuka grinned triumphantly and swept out of the room. As soon as she was gone, Shinji stood, still chuckling slightly.
"I'm still only beginning to understand, Kaorou." he said to no-one in particular. "And now I'm expected to help her? What a wonderful sense of irony God has."
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End of Epsiode 3
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