Or rather, the panel was trying to close.
I turned around and saw that the panel was closing about halfway; stopping, then opening again. It tried to close, but it only repeated the same process. Confused, I stepped back towards the entrance of the tunnel. The red light stopped flashing, and the panel slid open again. I shone the light around the tunnel walls, seeing for the first time the small square on the floor, and I guessed I had stepped on it, making it sink and causing some sort of reaction, but something was missing, so it stopped. "Huh," I said to myself. Then I turned around and walked back out of the tunnel.
I handed the light back to Tashi and then swung myself back up onto the panel with his help. When I was back up there, he surprised me by pulling me into a rough hug.
"Don't ever do that again," he whispered in my ear. "You scared me half to death."
"I'm fine," I assured him, more confused than ever. Tashi had stopped hugging me three years ago...
He let me go a few moments later, pulling back to look at me with an unreadable expression on his face. "Good," he said finally. "C'mon, let's see if we can get this thing closed again." He turned and crawled from the edge of the panel.
I followed, still wondering what had come over him.
We managed to get the panel closed by pressing the other button in the smaller panel, but the cloth that had been covering the Unit was gone, so we couldn't pull that over again. Tashi went up first, and then sent the rope flying back down to me. I patted Unit-01 lovingly before catching hold of the rope and Tashi lifted me up to the top of the shaft.
It was a couple months after I turned fourteen that we got Unit-01 working.
The leaders allowed us more freedom now. Tashi had appealed to them quietly, saying that we couldn't possilbly couldn't find NERV HQ without going off for a few days at a time. He also insisted that we couldn't possibly take a radio with us; it would just attract any errant power down here, and we could be electrocuted. He said it with just the right amount of awe and fear in his voice and posture that they believed we would come back, no matter what. Like we couldn't think for ourselves or escape or make it on our own.
So we always went back to the Unit, just to see if we could make it work again.
By then, we could jury rig anything that needed a power supply and was electronical. Tashi found a generator which he got working again, and had attached some cables to some lights we had found and hung around Unit-01. Now we could see what we were doing.
We had poked around a bit more, finding what was left of what the door had once said "Central Control." Inside was various bits and pieces of what had been the ceiling lying all over the place, and what looked like chairs were scattered across the floor. Computer consoles were dark and some screens were broken. We tried to get one working again, and it turned out that I had the best luck at this.
I had next to no knowledge of electronics and the operating of computers, yet it took me less than a month to get one of them working and accessing files. That was how we learned about the EVA's.
There was more than just Unit-01, which had been our assumption until then. There was Units-00 to 13. 00 to 04 needed pilots, thought sensors, entry plugs and external power sources, but 05 through 13 were completely independant. We learned what exactly the entry plugs were (they were long cylinders which held the pilots and the vital portions that made the Unit run) and what they did, plus the uses of the thought sensors, placed on the head of the pilot. We also discovered that not all the Units had been destroyed, but had been left in NERV HQ.
We searched for the other Units, but we didn't search very hard. We had found Unit-01's entry plug and were primarily concerned with getting it operational again.
Like everything else we had found, the entry plug needed cleaning, badly. We had to take an entire week and a half just to get the door clear, and another half a week to clean the manual door release out. Then we opened the door and peered inside.
The air was stale of course, but we ignored it and waited until it had cleared out. Then we could see the pilot's seat and hand controls...and a suit and thought sensors lying on the seat. It was a major find.
I crawled into the plug, excited, and pulled the suit and sensors off the seat. I backed out of the plug and handed the sensors to Tashi, holding up the suit.
"Isn't this great?" I asked enthusiastically. "We found the essential parts of the Unit!"
"Not really," Tashi said calmly, examining the sensors. "These are just supposed to help. But that's not the point," he added. "We did make a major find."
The day afterwards, we decided to try the plug out. Tashi went first, placing the sensors on his head and climbimg inside. I shut the door behind him, and waited quietly. He was inside a long time. Just when the silence got unbearable and I was about to open the door, it swung open on its own and Tashi stumbled out, coughing.
"It doesn't -- " He stopped to cough. "It has a personality," he continued as I got in next to him and helped him out. "I don't know how, but it has a distinct personality, and it doesn't like me." He looked up at me, his eyes clouded slightly. Then he slowly reached up and pulled the sensors off of his head. "Here, you try it. It might like you."
Startled, I took the sensors from him and affixed them to my head like I had seen him do. Then I got up and climbed into the entry plug, closing the door behind me. I faced the cramped inside and sat down in the pilot's seat, placing my hands lightly on the controls.
It was a unique experience. I sat there for an indeterminate amount of time, looking about me at the dark interior in awe. Then, when I let myself relax and get used to the surroundings -- the smell and feel of the place -- I felt what Tashi had: a distinct personality.
It wasn't the plug; I knew that without really realizing it. It was the Unit itself, reaching out to the plug and into the sensors. I could feel it lightly touching the edges of my mind, and that scared me. It seemed to know that and pulled out. For the next few minutes, I could feel it's conscience running over and through me, exploring whatever it was that made me.
Then came the distinct and very clear thought: I like you.
It was shocking; it took me a moment to recover from that, and when I had, I realized that the conscience was gone.
Stunned, I got out of the plug.
Tashi was waiting for me; he took hold of me as soon as I stepped out of the plug. "How was it?" he asked tensely.
I couldn't reply for a moment. "It likes me," I said softly. "I don't know how, or why, but it told me that it liked me."
Tashi seemed surprised for a moment. "Truly?" he asked.
I looked up at him, knowing that he could read what I was feeling in my eyes. "Truly," I whispered, dropping my gaze.
He was silent a moment longer, and then he cheered loudly.
I stared up at him, surprised beyond belief.
"This is great!" he cried, lifting me up in the air and swinging me around. He set me down and hugged me tightly. "We have a hope now," he whispered in my ear. "We just might, beyond all expectations, actually make this work!"
I smiled, and rested my head against his shoulder. He continued to hold me for some time, until he carefully and gently pushed me away, his hands still resting on my shoulders.
"C'mon," he said warmly, smiling at me, "let's keep working."
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Characters & concept: © 1997-2002 Katsura /\ Evangelion © Gainax