(Sorry about the delay...I was on vacation. Anyway, here you go, chapter 7 of "The Evangelion Matrix." Or is it 6? Oh, well. Enjoy and R&R, as usual.)
(By the way, I refer to Sailor Mars, aka Rei, as 'Scout Mars' in this. That's so you don't get confused which Rei is which.)
Back onboard the Bebop, Maya Ibuki was trying to stay awake. She had patched into a satellite feed and was watching the onscreen code, but nothing untoward was happening.
The radio from the bridge crackled. "How's it going?" Ritsuko asked.
"They're on their way back." Maya noticed something out of the corner of her eye. Something was wrong. "What is that?"
Gendo walked through the door to Maison Ikkoku first this time, his cellphone already out. "Ed, we're back."
"Ed's ready!" Ed's too-cheerful voice replied.
They walked up the spiral staircase, heading for the penthouse apartment they had arrived in. Shinji's mind was still whirling with what Belldandy had told him. It made sense. It made no sense. He was more confused than before. Was he this legendary Third Child or not? Why wouldn't anyone just out and tell him, rather than couch everything in engimatic phrases?
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw something move. He looked, and saw it was only a cat, a black cat. It looked back at him and walked away, tail high. "That's weird," he said aloud.
"What?" Asuka replied.
"Nothing...just that cat that just walked by."
Everyone stopped. "What about it?" Asuka asked, her voice tinged with fear.
Shinji felt stupid. "Well...it had a crescent moon or something on its head."
"Uh oh," Asuka said.
"Toji, Rei, weapons," Gendo snapped. Instantly both Toji and Rei had produced wicked-looking pistols from shoulder holsters. Toji threw one to Shinji, who awkwardly caught it.
"What is it?" Shinji asked Asuka.
Asuka began putting together a submachinegun from components in her purse. "A cat like that can mean only one thing. The Scouts are here."
Gendo nodded. "Let's go."
Ed picked up her cell phone. "Ed wants a quarter," she mock-whined into the phone.
"Ed, this is no time for games!" Maya shouted. "They cut the hard line, it's a trap! Get out of there!"
Ed, still holding the phone, dashed over to the window behind her, to look outside. She jerked back the curtains. The window was gone. In its place was bricked up wall. Three of the remaining five windows were the same way. Ed heard helicopters land on the roof, then the sound of boots on the walls; a split-second later, heavily armored AD Policemen were at the windows.
Ed knew she had only seconds. She turned and shouted down the stairwell, "Imperials in sector 47!" She then reached into an opened case at her bare feet, pulled out two pistols, and whipped around as the AD Police came through the windows. "Stinky gas!" she yelled, and let fly. "Here I come, Faye Faye!"
She got the first two before the second team got her.
Gendo heard the gunfire and stopped on the eighth floor landing. He shoved Rei and Kaworu towards the nearest room off the landing. "Everyone in there!"
"What about Ed?" Toji cried.
"We'll come back for her," Gendo lied.
They dashed into the room, Asuka kicking the door shut behind them. Kaworu opened the drapes. "That's what they changed. We're trapped! There's no way out!" He looked close to panic.
"Be calm," Gendo said evenly. "Give me your phone."
"They'll be able to track it," Asuka warned.
"We have no choice," Gendo replied. He quickly punched in the numbers.
"Operator," came Maya's voice from back on the Bebop, sounding tinny in the small phone.
"Maya, find a structural drawing of this building. Quickly."
Maya's fingers flew over the keys, searching the Bebop's database. Luckily, the Maison Ikkoku had been an entryway into the Eva Matrix for some time. "Got it."
"I need the main wet wall."
"Into the bathroom, far wall. You'll have to–" Maya's voice broke up in static as someone else overrode the line. Gendo knew of only two people who could do that, and Ritsuko was standing over Maya's shoulder. "Ed?" he said into the phone, hoping.
It was a female voice that replied, but it wasn't Ed's. "Ed's dead, baby. Ed's dead," the voice said. Gendo snapped the phone shut. "Toji. Bathroom, far wall from the door." He tossed the phone back to Kaworu, pretending it was the dust in the air that made his eyes water.
Scout Mars touched her earphone communicator. "Eighth floor."
"Eighth floor," she heard Serena reply.
Mars nodded, threw the phone to one of the AD Policemen, stepped over the unmoving body of a young, rose-cheeked girl, and ran towards the stairwell. A few moments later, she was on the eighth floor. Asuka had locked the door, but that was little trouble for Scout Mars, who simply threw a strip of paper at the door. Nothing happened for a moment, then the door was turned to matchwood by a tremendous explosion. Mars stepped through the burning remains, and looked around the room. There was no one there.
"Where are they?" she wondered aloud as a AD Police squad began searching. None of them noticed a pile of towels thrown into one corner of the bathroom. Nor did they notice the hole behind it.
Two stories below the hole, strung out single file, were the remaining members of Gendo's team. Each carefully placed their feet and hands as they moved between the thick outer wall and the thin drywall, moving like chimneysweepers in the tight space. Toji had taken point with Kaworu; Shinji was between Rei on the bottom and Asuka on top, with Gendo bringing up the rear. Shinji nearly slipped but managed to catch himself just above Rei, and looked up, straight at Asuka's rather shapely derierre. He quickly looked down, but not before Asuka kicked him in the head–not hard enough to make him fall, but more than hard enough to get her point across.
Rei, frowning at Asuka, suddenly looked at the wall in front of her. "Shh," she whispered. No one doubted Rei's instincts; they all halted in place.
On the other side of the wall, an AD Policeman had walked into a bathroom. He swept his submachinegun around, shining the attached flashlight into corners and behind the toilet. He thought he had heard something, but there was nothing there now.
"Hey, um..." he asked hesitatingly. "Is...er...is anyone there?"
"No," Kaworu replied, in a classic show of not engaging brain before mouth.
"Oh, okay," the policeman replied. He turned to go and took two steps before the synapses fired. He turned and opened fire, spraying bullets haphazardly around the room. "They're in the walls! They're in the walls!" he yelled.
Shinji, before he even realized he was doing it, pulled the pistol from his pocket, braced, and fired back. His shots seemed random, but they were actually a careful pattern. He was rewarded as he heard the clatter of a submachinegun on the tiled floor of the bathroom, followed closely by the thump of a body. "Nothing personal," he said. Where have I heard that before? Shinji asked himself. He looked up, and Asuka gave him a thumbs-up.
They were getting ready to move again when a scepter smashed through the drywall, the heart on its end nearly impaling Shinji. Shinji screamed in panic, seeing a face through the remains of the drywall, a face framed in blonde hair.
"It's a Scout!" Kaworu yelled.
Shinji struggled to push the scepter back, while Asuka began trying to kick at it, draw her pistol, and stay balanced all at once. The scepter began to glow.
"Matrix Gorgeous–" Serena began to intone.
And Gendo knew what he had to do.
"Rei, expand your AT field! NOW!" he shouted.
Rei did not question her orders; she never did. She simply concentrated, her red eyes looking at the wall before her. It disintegrated in an explosion, sending Asuka and Shinji tumbling down, colliding with Rei. Between the three of them, they managed to halt their fall a story below the gaping hole in the wall. Gendo, however, did not fall downwards, but forwards as he pushed off the stone behind him. He crashed into Serena sending them both into the tiled floor, the scepter spinning off to parts unknown.
"Commander Ikari!" Asuka screamed.
"You must get Shinji out!" Gendo yelled back. "He's all that matters!"
"Father! No!" Shinji tried to claw back upwards. "Father!"
"We must go!" Rei exclaimed, and grabbed Shinji's shirt, pulling them down. She delivered a savage kick downwards to encourage Kaworu, who had frozen. They slid down the narrow shaft, heading for the basement.
Gendo turned his attention to the girl beneath him. Her sunglasses had come off, and he had to admit she was kind of attractive, in a ditzy schoolgirl kind of way. She smiled up at him. "The great Morpheus," she said. "Or should I say, Gendo Ikari. Pleased to meetcha."
"And you are?" Gendo asked.
"Serena. Agent Moon."
"You look the same to me without your fukus to tell you apart."
Serena shrugged, then effortlessly tossed Gendo into the nearest wall. She rose to her feet, worked out a kink in her neck, and posed. Gendo, not impressed, ran forward and smashed a fist into her stomach, the approved anime way to render any girl unconscious. Serena only took a step backwards. Gendo followed up with a vicious high kick to her chest, then a spin on one foot, followed by a snap kick to her face. Serena flew into the opposite wall, shivering tiles from it.
"Meanie," she replied, shaking off the dust.
She moved in ablur, kicking towards Gendo's shins. He managed to block that kick and the next, but the third hit him in the chest, sending him stumbling back towards the toilet. He barely had time to register he had been hit before Serena delivered a roundhouse punch to his jaw. Teeth cracked, and Gendo went down, but he didn't stay there. He rose into a three-point stance and kicked out at a surprised Serena. She fell, but was back on her feet in a blink of an eye, sliding across the floor and knocking Gendo back down. She reached down and grabbed him by his beard, raising a fist to further bludgeon his already bleeding face.
"Not the beard!" Gendo screeched.
"Oh, sorry," Serena replied, and let go. Gendo flailed the air for a moment before crashing into the toilet bowl. He tried to get up, but then Serena hit him again. She grabbed his coat this time, flipped him over, and shoved his head into the bowl. Adding insult to injury, she flushed it. Gendo struggled, but she held his head under. Once the bowl was emptied, she dragged him up and smashed his head into the wall. He slumped down.
"Not bad for an old has-been," she said to the AD Police squad.
Gendo spit out a gob of blood, and struggled to his feet. "You...you were never cruel," he struggled out. "What...ever happened to love...and justice?"
Serena shrugged. "Times change." She motioned the squad forward. "Take him."
Gendo, like Ed, was able to throw two of the guards into the walls before the other five smashed him to the floor with the butts of their submachineguns.
"No, no!" Maya cried, hitting her small hands against the computer console.
Ritsuko closed her eyes. Once, she knew, she would have welcomed watching Gendo Ikari get beaten senseless. But as Serena had said, times change. Ritsuko opened her eyes and put a hand on Maya's shoulder. "We'll worry about him later," she sighed. "Where's the main team?"
Maya forced herself to decipher the data streams. "The basement, it looks like."
The rest of them had made it to the basement with nothing more than sundry scrapes and bruises. Toji, Rei, and Shinji led the way, Kaworu and Asuka covering the rear. Another squad of AD Police clambered down the stairwell, but Asuka, screaming like an enraged banshee, emptied her submachinegun at the squad, sending them dashing for cover. Kaworu fired a quick three rounds, then turned to go as Asuka reloaded with her one remaining clip. She looked up, sighting on the AD Policemen, and saw to her horror that Kaworu had gone down–either tripped or shot from behind.
She had never particularly liked Kaworu, but she started forward. He waved her off, telling her to go on. Asuka almost disobeyed him, but the AD Police were closing in. "Dammit," she breathed, fired off a few desultory rounds in their direction, turned, and fled after Rei, Toji, and Shinji.
The AD Police surrounded Kaworu, nearly blinding him with their flashlights. He sighed, smiled beatifically, and raised his hands in surrender.
Maya had moved to one side, as Ritsuko was the better typist and could read the data much quicker. She watched her sempai in amazement as Ritsuko's fingers flew across the board, sending out tracker bugs and hacking into the AD Police net.
The cell phone beeped in Maya's earpiece. "Operator," she said, her voice sad. They had lost three people today, the worst ever–Ed, Gendo, and--
"I need an exit fast!"
"Kaworu?!" she exclaimed happily. "But you were–"
"There was an accident. Damned car accident! I was in the paddywagon, and all of a sudden, boom!"
"Are you all right?"
"Crawled out the back. I guess I still have a guardian angel."
Maya rubbed her eyes and typed in a few commands. "Gotcha." He was at Asamiya and Tomizawa.
"Can you get me out of here?"
"Yep. Intersection of Miyazaki and Oshii. There's a manga shop there."
"Hai. On my way."
Asuka caught up with the rest of the team in an alley two blocks from the Maison Ikkoku. She looked back as she caught her breath, but all they could see were several AD Police VTOLs and helicopters orbiting around the building. They moved into the shadow of a dumpster, and Asuka flipped open her cell phone. "Maya, it's me," she said, too tired for codenames or passwords.
"Is Father alive?" Shinji asked before anyone could say anything.
Asuka held up a hand for silence. "Is Commander Ikari alive, Maya?"
Ritsuko came on the line. "They're moving him. I don't know where to yet."
"He's alive," she said to the other three. There was some relief in their faces. Asuka nodded. "We need an exit," she told Ritsuko.
"You're not far from Kaworu," Maya answered.
"Kaworu? But I saw him go down!"
"I know. He managed to get out of it. He's at a manga shop at Miyazaki and Oshii."
"Got it. We're moving." Asuka snapped the cell shut. "Kaworu–that pasty-faced dummkopf has more lives than a cat. He made it out, somehow."
Toji grinned. "Good for him. Let's go!"
Shinji and Asuka shared a tired smile, grateful for the small victory of Kaworu's escape. Only Rei did not smile. She gripped her pistol harder than ever, her small mouth a thin line. Something was wrong.
Ritsuko unstrapped Kaworu from the chair, back in the real world of the Bebop. He shook his head, took a few deep breaths, and shakily stood up. Ritsuko nodded at him, then went over to check Gendo's vital signs.
Maya winked back at Kaworu. "You made it."
"Yes. Where are they?" He thumbed back at the team, still in their chairs. Only Ed did not look peacefully asleep, as Ritsuko unstrapped her limp body and wrapped it in a sheet, with more kindness than anyone thought possible.
Maya looked at her screen. "They're at the manga shop. Making the call now."
"Good." Kaworu walked over and opened a closet that held the Bebop's small store of personal weapons. He withdrew the largest weapon on the ship besides the SIT, a gigantic Hellsing Mark 30 Overcompensation Particle Cannon. He aimed it at Maya's back and pulled the trigger.
They had reached the manga shop safely. Asuka had to pull Shinji away from the rack of Please Teacher, and No Don't Put It There. "You first, baka," she said, holding out the old rotary dial phone behind the counter. The owner of the shop was peacefully sleeping on the floor, thanks to a neck chop from one Rei Ayanami.
The blast from the Hellsing went through Maya's chair. She arched her back in a strangled scream, then the blast threw her into the computer console, where she slumped to the deck, her body smoking.
Ritsuko heard the Hellsing's blast and turned. She saw Kaworu swing the gun in her direction, and dashed forward, knowing she would never make it. "No!"
Kaworu fired again, the energy beam blasting into Ritsuko's side, stopping her cold. She looked down at the bloody burn for a moment, then stumbled forward, her fingernails grasping for Kaworu's neck. "You...betrayed us...again!" she screamed through bloody teeth.
"Kuso," Kaworu growled, readjusted the settings, and stuck the barrel between Ritsuko's breasts, pulling the trigger once more.
Shinji held up the phone. "I don't know, Asuka. It just went dead."
"Ooh, Shinji! You could burn water!" She snatched the phone from his hand, slammed it down on the reciever, then redialed the number, holding the phone to her own ear this time.
It rang twice, then someone picked it up. "Hello, Second Child."
"Kaworu?" Asuka's eyebrows beetled together in confusion. "Where's Maya?"
"You know, for a long time, I thought I was in love with you, Asuka," Kaworu answered instead. "I used to dream about you. Then Shinji came along. But that's all right. You're both beautiful, you know that? I wanted you both. And Rei too. Oh well. Too bad things had to turn out this way."
Asuka went pale as realization dawned on her. "Oh, mein Gott. You killed them."
"Say what?" Toji looked up from a copy of Aura Battler Dunbine. Rei put down her copy of Love Hina. "No," she breathed.
In the real world, Kaworu nudged Maya's body. She did not move, and did not seem to be breathing, so he walked towards the semicircle of chairs. He had dropped the Hellsing, which had overloaded from being fired at close range. It had killed Ritsuko, however, and that was all he cared about. "I am tired, Asuka," he said into the boom mike. "I'm tired of this war. I'm tired of fighting. I'm tired of this life, this ship, being cold, eating the same goop every day. Most of all, I'm tired of that bastard Gendo and all his bullshit." He reached Gendo's side and stared down into his slack face. He grabbed Gendo's beard, his face twisting into a rictus of hatred. "Surprise, fool! I bet you never saw this coming, did you? You thought I had forgotten what you did to my brothers and sisters. You thought I would forget!" He let Gendo go. "I wish I could be there, when they break you. I wish I could just walk in when it happens, so you know that it would be me. I don't blame Shinji for my death before. It was my choice, but you–you manipulated all of us into it!"
"You gave them the Commander!" Asuka shrieked into his earpiece.
Kaworu winced. "He lied to us, Second Child. He tricked us." He looked back to Gendo. "If you had told us the truth, we would have told you to shove that red pocky right up your ass!"
"That's not true, Kaworu," Asuka snapped. "He set us free."
"Free!" Kaworu snarled. "You call this free?" He moved away from Gendo. "All I do is what he tells me to do. Just like SEELE, but no better. If I had to choose between him and the Eva Matrix, I'll choose the latter."
"Kaworu, what are you talking about?" Asuka said. "SEELE? What's that? The Eva Matrix isn't real!"
Kaworu smiled. "I disagree, Second Child. I think the Eva Matrix can be more real than this world. All I do is pull the plug here...but there, you get to watch that musclebound fool Toji die."
Toji's eyes widened. "Oh, shit. Why do I always get hammered?!"
Rei shook her head. "No! No!"
Toji suddenly went stiff, then collapsed to the ground. Rei bent down, shaking him. "At least...I didn't...lose any limbs..." Toji stammered, then he closed his eyes and died. Shinji came over and tried to revive him, knowing it would do no good, but he could not simply stand there.
"Damn you to hell, Kaworu!" Asuka shouted.
"Welcome to the real world," Kaworu sighed.
"But...but you're out, Kaworu. You can't go back." Asuka pleaded. He could hear the tears in her eyes, and was glad that he had finally gotten her to do something besides insult him.
"That's what you think," Kaworu said. "They're going to reinsert my body. I go back to sleep, and when I wake up, I won't remember anything. Or maybe I will...I did when Gendo found me. I remembered it all. Maybe this time I can really cause Third Impact on the Censors, too!" He brushed Rei's hair. "By the way, if you want the chance to call Rei 'Wondergirl' or 'Doll' again, I suggest you do so now." His hand closed around the connecting rod.
Asuka looked at Rei, their eyes locking. "No. Please don't." She did not like Rei much, but she certainly didn't want to watch her die.
Rei nodded. "It won't be like this. Commander Ikari has–" Then she stiffened as Toji had, and slumped to the floor, her eyes staring at nothing.
"AHHHHH!!!" Shinji screamed. "NOOO!!!"
"Too late," Kaworu sighed again.
"You bastard!" Asuka yelled, nearly deafening him. "When I get up there, I'm going to so kick your ass–"
"Don't hate me, Second Child. I'm just a messenger, and right now I'll prove it." He walked over to Shinji, ran a hand across his cheek, then grabbed the connecting rod. "If Gendo was right, then there's no way I can pull this plug. If Shinji is the true Third Child, then there would have to be some kind of miracle to stop me, neh? How can he be the Third Child if he is dead?" He heard a door hiss open from somewhere towards the warp core, and looked over. Maya still lay there, and Ritsuko's corpse continue to smoke. Ed's body was wrapped in a sheet, and Toji and Rei were obviously dead as well. He shrugged. "You never did answer me before if you bought into Gendo's lies. All I want is a yes or no. Look into his eyes, those big, pretty, sexy eyes, and tell me. Yes or no?"
Asuka looked over at Shinji, who had stood, unable to move, unable to do anything but accept his fate. She felt tears on her face, but didn't care any more. Nothing mattered anymore. But despite herself, she still believed. "Yes," she replied quietly.
"Sorry, I say no..." Kaworu's voice trailed off.
He looked around, his eyes wide. He glanced at Maya, Ritsuko, Toji, Ed, and then Rei. They were all dead. Therefore, who stood before him should not exist. "You're dead. I killed you. I pulled your plug."
"I got better," the figure said. She was on Kaworu before he could react, her pale fingers tightening around his skull.
Asuka looked at the phone, then Shinji. The line had gone dead again. She hung up the phone as Shinji ran his hands over his body. He was still alive. He looked down at Rei and Toji, but they were still dead.
There was silence for a few moments, then the phone rang again. Both of them jumped, then stared at the phone, neither really wanting to pick it up. Shinji took a step forward, hesitated, and picked it up. "Hello?" His face suddenly lit up. "It's for you!"
Asuka woke with a gasp. She was back on the Bebop, back breathing its reprocessed air. Maya stood over her, trying not to show the pain of her burns. There was a bandage loosely wrapped around her middle. She gently disconnected Asuka, who sat up. "You're hurt," Asuka said.
Maya smiled painfully. "I'll be okay."
"Kaworu?" Asuka followed Maya's pointing finger. Kaworu's body lay in a pool of blood over by his old chair. His head, on the other hand, lay near the computer console. "No way, you're not that–" Then she saw who was unstrapping Shinji.
"Rei?!" they both said simutaneously.
"Wondergirl?" Asuka added.
"We saw you–" Shinji began.
Rei smiled slightly. She wore only a blanket, and her skin still shone with some sort of sticky fluid. "That body, yes. You should know better, both of you. I cannot die."
"Okay, I was out for popcorn that day," Asuka said, getting to her feet. "Mind explaining?"
Rei–or Rei II, perhaps–nodded. "Commander Ikari knew that there was always a chance that a traitor might be aboard the Bebop, or someone might turn against us. Therefore, he installed several clones of my body down in the ship's cooling tanks. When my old body died, Magi automatically downloaded my consciousness into a new body. I walked up here and neutralized Kaworu."
"You tore his head off," Shinji said, his stomach turning slightly.
"I still don't get it." Asuka shook her head.
"Also, one of the reviewers of this fanfic said that he'd kill the author if I died. Since I was scripted to die, that caused a problem. Hence, here I am still. Neat, neh?"
"Ah, now I get it," Asuka grinned. It faded as she looked around her. "We'd better clean up and take stock." She decided not to get offended when Shinji hugged Rei.