The P.E.A.C.E. Project, part II
Nick walked out of the hospital, where he had been for a week. Shinji was still in a coma, and two of Gendo's people had been 'escorting' Nick to the train station, where he would be forced onto a train and shipped back to the US. Of course, Nick had other plans.
"Hey, I've gotta go to the bathroom." He complained, hoping to get away from witnesses.
"There's a bathroom in that restaurant. Let's just get this over with." The two guards went in, one staying outside the bathroom; the other going in to make sure Nick didn't try anything. The American entered a stall, and took something out of his backpack; a suit that looked like it was made of loosely woven wire, very stiff. Nick struggled, and put the suit on.
"Hey, what's taking so long?" The NERV Guard asked.
"Nothing, just pulling my pants on." Nick twisted a dial on the wire suit, and the suit started glowing black, and tried to push away from his body. Nick unlocked the door, and the guard stepped back to let him out. It was the last mistake the guard made.
Nick punched through the door, the wood shattering as the repelling field pushed into it. The guard crumpled to the ground, his neck snapped at an odd angle. Nick jumped out a window, his strength enhanced by the suit. Even before he hit the ground, the other guard was firing at him, the sharp sound of the handgun echoing through the streets. The bullets rebounded off the repulser suit bounced them away. Nick ducked into an alley.
"I wonder what happened to that damn American..." Mused Asuka. She was bored, without even Shinji to bother. Suddenly there came a rapping, as of someone gently tapping, tapping on the apartment door. "Hey, maybe Shinji's back!" Asuka walked over to the door, but before she could open it, it was kicked open. Nick pushed her aside before she was hit by the three shots fired at his back by the guard. They went into the floor, deflected by the suit. Nick looked at her.
"Asuka, give me a gun, NOW!" Nick jumped away from the doorway. Asuka just sat where Nick had thrown her.
"What's going on?"
"ASUKA, STOP BEING A DUMBASS AND GET ME A GUN!!!" Nick screamed. Asuka nodded and ran into Misato's room, grabbing the pistol Misato always left there. She ran back and handed it to Nick, who glanced at it worriedly.
"What? It's a gun, isn't it?"
"Got anything more powerful?"
"What, you think I keep an assault rifle in my room?"
"Doesn't everybody?" Nick said, as he took careful aim at the guard. With a quick shot, he killed the man. Nick sighed in relief, collapsing like a rag doll onto the floor. Asuka looked over him. His repeller suit was heavily damaged; wires bent and snapped, the black glow flickering. He deactivated it, and took off the heavy garment. Clutching his side, he walked outside and over to the guard. Asuka took one look at the fallen man and gasped.
"That...That's a member of NERV..." She whispered.
"He was." Nick agreed, picking up the body and throwing it over the balcony into a dumpster.
"Why did you kill him?"
"Because Gendo tried to have me killed." Nick looked around. People were coming out of their apartments and looking around to see what had happened. "Let's go inside."
"They were hitmen?" Asuka asked, confused.
"Of the highest quality. NERV Section 31. They remove anything that doesn't fit into NERV's plan." Nick replied, rubbing a rib that had broken when the suit failed for a moment.
"Then what'll you do, you can't stay here!"
"Right. I'm just going to walk into NERV Central and ask Gendo if he's having a nice day."
"Doesn't seem like much of a plan..."
"You know, you're right. It would sound better if I said Good Morning. Thanks for the idea, I'll be sleeping in Shinji's room." Nick walked away from Asuka before she exploded into one of her rants.
Gendo almost smiled as he sat down in his command chair, thinking about what a great day he'd have, with Nick dead in a train accident, and PEACE off of his back. He heard someone clear his or her throat behind him, and spun around, his good mood fading instantly into a deep horror. Either Nick had come back from the dead to haunt him, or...
"You survived..." Gendo whispered breathlessly.
"Not having a good morning?" Asked Nick, smiling.
"Why are you here?" snarled the Nerv commander.
"Simple. I'm here to tell you that I'm returning to the states. And I'm taking Theta with me."
"Theta is now NERV property. You will leave it here."
"If it's NERV Property, why is it already gone?" Nick asked as he walked away.
"So... Nick is gone?" Shinji asked, not quite yet getting the point.
"Right! No more Americans to steal my glory!" Asuka responded, happier than usual.
"It's going to take a while before either unit One or Zero will be able to fight again. We could have used his help."
"No way! You saw what he and his Eva did!" Asuka yelled. Shinji just nodded, remembering the video he had seen. Nick's unit Theta had apparently gone insane, and had shattered both of Unit One's arms before ripping out the angel's core and crushing it in fiery claws. It kept attacking unit One, ripping glowing gashes in its purple and green armor, unit Rei tried to stop it. What happened next was the point of some debate among NERV personnel. Apparently, unit Zero's head just blew up, splattering across the walls of cage 7. No weapon had been fired, and the Eva wouldn't just self-destruct, so it remained a mystery.
"Still, though, that Angel might have destroyed the geofront if he hadn't stopped it."
"We don't know how he did it though! Theta has no AT field, Nick said so himself!"
"Maybe he was lucky."
"Shinji?"
"What?"
"You're a moron."
"Sorry."
Nick watched Japan recede into the distance from his seat on PEACE's Eva transport. The transport was a heavy, slow plane, but it would get you there.
"You know, I was hoping that would go better." Nick said, speaking to the man sitting next to him.
"I heard what happened. Wasn't your fault, Ikari always was a slow person." responded the tall, dark man.
"Maybe, but I still feel sorry for leaving him with only one Eva."
"If an Angel attacks there he'll stop it. He may be slow, but he's usually right. He has a real grip on tactics."
"I just hope he can-" Abruptly, the plane angled down at a forty-five degree slope. A voice came over the loudspeaker:
"An angel is coming right at us! We're moving to evade, but we need some help!" Nick stood up and ran to the cargo hold as the plane made a few more abrupt turns. Before getting into Theta, Nick nodded to the man and smiled.
"Maybe we'll end up helping him after all."
The Angel was the size of a 747, and looked like little more than a flying wing with two claws hanging on its underside. It's core was on it's top, and although it was but ugly, it was deadly. Nick fired a few rounds of auto cannon into the Angel, getting its attention. The Angel rose up, and swooped down towards Unit Theta, claws first. Nick didn't even flinch as the Angel slammed into Theta with enough force to knock it off of the transport plane. As Nick and the Angel fell towards the water, Nick activated Theta's Plasma claws and drove them into the Angel's wing. Then the two fell into the water hard enough that certain people took notice.
"What was that?" Gendo demanded, the splash setting off alarms set to detect submerged angels.
"One...no, two large objects just fell into the water just inside international waters!" yelled the ensign, panic rising all over NERV Central.
"What are they? Get the camera drones online!" In a moment, a blurry picture appeared on the main screen. Unit Theta was there, standing on the sea bottom. Around it, just in range of the camera, swum the Angel.
"Anyone want to place a bet?" Asked Misato, seeing the battle between the Angel and Theta as something Nick deserved.
Nick smiled. The Angels weren't that hard to beat. He'd had to take a few on already, and none of them had had a chance. Suddenly, the Angel slammed into Theta. Or, at least, tried to slam into Theta. Theta's matter- repelling field was on at full strength, black light radiating all around it as Theta repelled even the water. The Angel grabbed around Theta's arm with its claws, unable to touch it, and pulled. The arm ripped away in a spray of sparks and white blood.
Misato waited for Nick's scream, knowing Eva pilots felt the pain their mecha felt, but was sorely disappointed over the hacked comm system Nick made a rude comment about the angel in a way that would have sent a nun screaming into another room with hands clasped over her ears, but didn't even say 'ouch'. Gendo noticed the looks on everyone's face and shrugged.
"His Eva is different from ours in many ways. It may be even closer to the Jet Alone internally." He said, reminding everyone that even he didn't know what was inside Theta.
Nick and the angel dueled for several more hours, the Angel slowly pushing him closer and closer to land. Nick managed to land a few solid hits with his remaining auto cannon, but nothing seemed to slow the angel down. Nick then got an idea. He was in a large amount of salt water. While neither pure water nor pure salt are electrolytes, substances that conduct electricity, together they are extremely conductive. Therefore, some kind of electrical attack might be in order. Nick currently had no means to make an electrical strike against his enemy. However, he had some friends in high, and low, places. With a few calls, he could get that attack, and, possibly, a great deal more.
"Hey! NERV orders are to disallow all use of this airfield!" The guard yelled. A plane was trying to take off, an unmarked black plane equipped with a large cargo bay and equipped for paradrop. A man in a black suit had stopped the security guard before he could get to the plane, and was now standing in front of him, arms crossed.
"NERV does not have jurisdiction over my organization." The man said, light glinting off the dark glasses he wore even now, near twilight and with a storm approaching.
"And what unit is that? Either show me some ID or I'll be forced to fire upon you."
"This one." The man pulled out a badge that displayed only a few bits of information. A name, a country, and the name of the man's organization. It read: Mr. Lincoln; United States of America; Men in Black.
Nick kept moving to the pickup spot now highlighted on Theta's main screen. The angel was getting bored now, and was lashing out impatiently, like a wounded animal. Nick stepped into the drop zone and watched as the counter on his screen dropped to zero, signaling the arrival of the plane. He wouldn't be able to see it, more for the thunderstorm now raging above the water than Theta's weak sensors. He made a mental note to improve the resolution when he repaired Theta. Suddenly there was a splash, and Nick slammed Theta's throttle to the limit, jumping up to catch what the plane had dropped.
It was a weapon designed by a genius. Or a madman, depending on whom you ask. That man's name had been Nikola Tesla, who had designed the most dangerous and impressive electrical weapons ever created, and had helped, with his notes on advanced electromagnetism, to design Theta's repulsion fields. The weapon itself was an oddly shaped rifle, long with two circular parts connected by two tubes. It was a particle accelerator, designed as a weapon of war. Nick pulled the trigger once, starting the flow of electrons into the chambers of the weapon. He waited for the angel to attack again, and when it did, he pulled the trigger again, dumping the massive electric charge into a beam a centimeter thick and with a difference of over ten billion volts. The angel spasmed and convulsed as it's nervous system was disintegrated. Nick just smiled, the field around Theta blocking electrical charges of any strength from coming through. The angel stopped moving and floated to the surface, now dead.
"Where the HELL did that gun come from ?!" Gendo demanded, his face red with rage.
"A sensor shows a plane dropping it, sir."
"GET ME THE AIRPORT ON MY COMM! NOW!!!" As the comm officer got to work, Gendo slumped into his chair, feeling truly defeated for perhaps the first time. Nick had seemed to know what he was going to do even before he did it, and in the game of minds, Gendo had come out a distant second. It was like the whole world was against him...
"I have the man in charge sir!" Called the comm officer. Gendo nodded, a signal that meant he was ready to receive the call on his personal unit. The face of the security guard appeared on the screen, and he was as white as a sheet.
"Sir, I didn't have a choice in letting that plane take off." The man started, and then trailed off, seemingly afraid to reveal his reasons.
"That's right. You DIDN'T have a choice. You were to stop ALL traffic." Gendo snarled.
"Sir, the man's authority was... above yours."
"WHAT?!"
"Sir, they were... they were..."
"Who were they, dammit, out with it!"
"T-they were the M-men in Black!" The guard managed to stammer. Gendo's jaw dropped, and he went slack. After a moment, the guard nodded, and Gendo terminated the transmission. Everything in NERV central was quiet; people all looking to him now. He blinked once, slowly, and sat up a bit.
"The... Men in Black..." He whispered, the sound echoing hollowly in the spacious room. Ritsuko dropped the binder she had been holding, and didn't even look down to when it hit the ground with a loud crack. The Men in Black, the near-mythical United States version of the KGB, had seen fit to help Nicolas Rivers, the most hated man in Japan, defeat an angel with an Eva that shouldn't exist, using technology that couldn't have been real. Just who was the man who hid under the name of Nicolas Rivers?
To be continued...
Nick walked out of the hospital, where he had been for a week. Shinji was still in a coma, and two of Gendo's people had been 'escorting' Nick to the train station, where he would be forced onto a train and shipped back to the US. Of course, Nick had other plans.
"Hey, I've gotta go to the bathroom." He complained, hoping to get away from witnesses.
"There's a bathroom in that restaurant. Let's just get this over with." The two guards went in, one staying outside the bathroom; the other going in to make sure Nick didn't try anything. The American entered a stall, and took something out of his backpack; a suit that looked like it was made of loosely woven wire, very stiff. Nick struggled, and put the suit on.
"Hey, what's taking so long?" The NERV Guard asked.
"Nothing, just pulling my pants on." Nick twisted a dial on the wire suit, and the suit started glowing black, and tried to push away from his body. Nick unlocked the door, and the guard stepped back to let him out. It was the last mistake the guard made.
Nick punched through the door, the wood shattering as the repelling field pushed into it. The guard crumpled to the ground, his neck snapped at an odd angle. Nick jumped out a window, his strength enhanced by the suit. Even before he hit the ground, the other guard was firing at him, the sharp sound of the handgun echoing through the streets. The bullets rebounded off the repulser suit bounced them away. Nick ducked into an alley.
"I wonder what happened to that damn American..." Mused Asuka. She was bored, without even Shinji to bother. Suddenly there came a rapping, as of someone gently tapping, tapping on the apartment door. "Hey, maybe Shinji's back!" Asuka walked over to the door, but before she could open it, it was kicked open. Nick pushed her aside before she was hit by the three shots fired at his back by the guard. They went into the floor, deflected by the suit. Nick looked at her.
"Asuka, give me a gun, NOW!" Nick jumped away from the doorway. Asuka just sat where Nick had thrown her.
"What's going on?"
"ASUKA, STOP BEING A DUMBASS AND GET ME A GUN!!!" Nick screamed. Asuka nodded and ran into Misato's room, grabbing the pistol Misato always left there. She ran back and handed it to Nick, who glanced at it worriedly.
"What? It's a gun, isn't it?"
"Got anything more powerful?"
"What, you think I keep an assault rifle in my room?"
"Doesn't everybody?" Nick said, as he took careful aim at the guard. With a quick shot, he killed the man. Nick sighed in relief, collapsing like a rag doll onto the floor. Asuka looked over him. His repeller suit was heavily damaged; wires bent and snapped, the black glow flickering. He deactivated it, and took off the heavy garment. Clutching his side, he walked outside and over to the guard. Asuka took one look at the fallen man and gasped.
"That...That's a member of NERV..." She whispered.
"He was." Nick agreed, picking up the body and throwing it over the balcony into a dumpster.
"Why did you kill him?"
"Because Gendo tried to have me killed." Nick looked around. People were coming out of their apartments and looking around to see what had happened. "Let's go inside."
"They were hitmen?" Asuka asked, confused.
"Of the highest quality. NERV Section 31. They remove anything that doesn't fit into NERV's plan." Nick replied, rubbing a rib that had broken when the suit failed for a moment.
"Then what'll you do, you can't stay here!"
"Right. I'm just going to walk into NERV Central and ask Gendo if he's having a nice day."
"Doesn't seem like much of a plan..."
"You know, you're right. It would sound better if I said Good Morning. Thanks for the idea, I'll be sleeping in Shinji's room." Nick walked away from Asuka before she exploded into one of her rants.
Gendo almost smiled as he sat down in his command chair, thinking about what a great day he'd have, with Nick dead in a train accident, and PEACE off of his back. He heard someone clear his or her throat behind him, and spun around, his good mood fading instantly into a deep horror. Either Nick had come back from the dead to haunt him, or...
"You survived..." Gendo whispered breathlessly.
"Not having a good morning?" Asked Nick, smiling.
"Why are you here?" snarled the Nerv commander.
"Simple. I'm here to tell you that I'm returning to the states. And I'm taking Theta with me."
"Theta is now NERV property. You will leave it here."
"If it's NERV Property, why is it already gone?" Nick asked as he walked away.
"So... Nick is gone?" Shinji asked, not quite yet getting the point.
"Right! No more Americans to steal my glory!" Asuka responded, happier than usual.
"It's going to take a while before either unit One or Zero will be able to fight again. We could have used his help."
"No way! You saw what he and his Eva did!" Asuka yelled. Shinji just nodded, remembering the video he had seen. Nick's unit Theta had apparently gone insane, and had shattered both of Unit One's arms before ripping out the angel's core and crushing it in fiery claws. It kept attacking unit One, ripping glowing gashes in its purple and green armor, unit Rei tried to stop it. What happened next was the point of some debate among NERV personnel. Apparently, unit Zero's head just blew up, splattering across the walls of cage 7. No weapon had been fired, and the Eva wouldn't just self-destruct, so it remained a mystery.
"Still, though, that Angel might have destroyed the geofront if he hadn't stopped it."
"We don't know how he did it though! Theta has no AT field, Nick said so himself!"
"Maybe he was lucky."
"Shinji?"
"What?"
"You're a moron."
"Sorry."
Nick watched Japan recede into the distance from his seat on PEACE's Eva transport. The transport was a heavy, slow plane, but it would get you there.
"You know, I was hoping that would go better." Nick said, speaking to the man sitting next to him.
"I heard what happened. Wasn't your fault, Ikari always was a slow person." responded the tall, dark man.
"Maybe, but I still feel sorry for leaving him with only one Eva."
"If an Angel attacks there he'll stop it. He may be slow, but he's usually right. He has a real grip on tactics."
"I just hope he can-" Abruptly, the plane angled down at a forty-five degree slope. A voice came over the loudspeaker:
"An angel is coming right at us! We're moving to evade, but we need some help!" Nick stood up and ran to the cargo hold as the plane made a few more abrupt turns. Before getting into Theta, Nick nodded to the man and smiled.
"Maybe we'll end up helping him after all."
The Angel was the size of a 747, and looked like little more than a flying wing with two claws hanging on its underside. It's core was on it's top, and although it was but ugly, it was deadly. Nick fired a few rounds of auto cannon into the Angel, getting its attention. The Angel rose up, and swooped down towards Unit Theta, claws first. Nick didn't even flinch as the Angel slammed into Theta with enough force to knock it off of the transport plane. As Nick and the Angel fell towards the water, Nick activated Theta's Plasma claws and drove them into the Angel's wing. Then the two fell into the water hard enough that certain people took notice.
"What was that?" Gendo demanded, the splash setting off alarms set to detect submerged angels.
"One...no, two large objects just fell into the water just inside international waters!" yelled the ensign, panic rising all over NERV Central.
"What are they? Get the camera drones online!" In a moment, a blurry picture appeared on the main screen. Unit Theta was there, standing on the sea bottom. Around it, just in range of the camera, swum the Angel.
"Anyone want to place a bet?" Asked Misato, seeing the battle between the Angel and Theta as something Nick deserved.
Nick smiled. The Angels weren't that hard to beat. He'd had to take a few on already, and none of them had had a chance. Suddenly, the Angel slammed into Theta. Or, at least, tried to slam into Theta. Theta's matter- repelling field was on at full strength, black light radiating all around it as Theta repelled even the water. The Angel grabbed around Theta's arm with its claws, unable to touch it, and pulled. The arm ripped away in a spray of sparks and white blood.
Misato waited for Nick's scream, knowing Eva pilots felt the pain their mecha felt, but was sorely disappointed over the hacked comm system Nick made a rude comment about the angel in a way that would have sent a nun screaming into another room with hands clasped over her ears, but didn't even say 'ouch'. Gendo noticed the looks on everyone's face and shrugged.
"His Eva is different from ours in many ways. It may be even closer to the Jet Alone internally." He said, reminding everyone that even he didn't know what was inside Theta.
Nick and the angel dueled for several more hours, the Angel slowly pushing him closer and closer to land. Nick managed to land a few solid hits with his remaining auto cannon, but nothing seemed to slow the angel down. Nick then got an idea. He was in a large amount of salt water. While neither pure water nor pure salt are electrolytes, substances that conduct electricity, together they are extremely conductive. Therefore, some kind of electrical attack might be in order. Nick currently had no means to make an electrical strike against his enemy. However, he had some friends in high, and low, places. With a few calls, he could get that attack, and, possibly, a great deal more.
"Hey! NERV orders are to disallow all use of this airfield!" The guard yelled. A plane was trying to take off, an unmarked black plane equipped with a large cargo bay and equipped for paradrop. A man in a black suit had stopped the security guard before he could get to the plane, and was now standing in front of him, arms crossed.
"NERV does not have jurisdiction over my organization." The man said, light glinting off the dark glasses he wore even now, near twilight and with a storm approaching.
"And what unit is that? Either show me some ID or I'll be forced to fire upon you."
"This one." The man pulled out a badge that displayed only a few bits of information. A name, a country, and the name of the man's organization. It read: Mr. Lincoln; United States of America; Men in Black.
Nick kept moving to the pickup spot now highlighted on Theta's main screen. The angel was getting bored now, and was lashing out impatiently, like a wounded animal. Nick stepped into the drop zone and watched as the counter on his screen dropped to zero, signaling the arrival of the plane. He wouldn't be able to see it, more for the thunderstorm now raging above the water than Theta's weak sensors. He made a mental note to improve the resolution when he repaired Theta. Suddenly there was a splash, and Nick slammed Theta's throttle to the limit, jumping up to catch what the plane had dropped.
It was a weapon designed by a genius. Or a madman, depending on whom you ask. That man's name had been Nikola Tesla, who had designed the most dangerous and impressive electrical weapons ever created, and had helped, with his notes on advanced electromagnetism, to design Theta's repulsion fields. The weapon itself was an oddly shaped rifle, long with two circular parts connected by two tubes. It was a particle accelerator, designed as a weapon of war. Nick pulled the trigger once, starting the flow of electrons into the chambers of the weapon. He waited for the angel to attack again, and when it did, he pulled the trigger again, dumping the massive electric charge into a beam a centimeter thick and with a difference of over ten billion volts. The angel spasmed and convulsed as it's nervous system was disintegrated. Nick just smiled, the field around Theta blocking electrical charges of any strength from coming through. The angel stopped moving and floated to the surface, now dead.
"Where the HELL did that gun come from ?!" Gendo demanded, his face red with rage.
"A sensor shows a plane dropping it, sir."
"GET ME THE AIRPORT ON MY COMM! NOW!!!" As the comm officer got to work, Gendo slumped into his chair, feeling truly defeated for perhaps the first time. Nick had seemed to know what he was going to do even before he did it, and in the game of minds, Gendo had come out a distant second. It was like the whole world was against him...
"I have the man in charge sir!" Called the comm officer. Gendo nodded, a signal that meant he was ready to receive the call on his personal unit. The face of the security guard appeared on the screen, and he was as white as a sheet.
"Sir, I didn't have a choice in letting that plane take off." The man started, and then trailed off, seemingly afraid to reveal his reasons.
"That's right. You DIDN'T have a choice. You were to stop ALL traffic." Gendo snarled.
"Sir, the man's authority was... above yours."
"WHAT?!"
"Sir, they were... they were..."
"Who were they, dammit, out with it!"
"T-they were the M-men in Black!" The guard managed to stammer. Gendo's jaw dropped, and he went slack. After a moment, the guard nodded, and Gendo terminated the transmission. Everything in NERV central was quiet; people all looking to him now. He blinked once, slowly, and sat up a bit.
"The... Men in Black..." He whispered, the sound echoing hollowly in the spacious room. Ritsuko dropped the binder she had been holding, and didn't even look down to when it hit the ground with a loud crack. The Men in Black, the near-mythical United States version of the KGB, had seen fit to help Nicolas Rivers, the most hated man in Japan, defeat an angel with an Eva that shouldn't exist, using technology that couldn't have been real. Just who was the man who hid under the name of Nicolas Rivers?
To be continued...
