Okay… so here's chapter two. I don't think it's quite as humorous as chapter one, but it seemed necessary to progress things along further. Once the basic characters and such are established, I can start being more original/random/insane/annoying/whatever.
Disclaimer: I have nothing to do with Gainax or any other company that might have legal ownership of Evangelion or anything else referenced in this story. Also, I hate you.
NERV HQ 2015
Episode Two: Shinji Does Something
There was once a man who owned two goats. He was a poor man, as the two goats could barely produce enough milk to feed himself, let alone to earn any semblance of a profit. The man grew tired of being poor, and so he tried and tried to get the goats to mate, that they might produce more goats. He tried for months, trying hundreds of traditional methods and even taking suggestions from random people, doing everything he could to encourage the goats to mate. But nothing worked. The man fell into a deep depression and slipped slowly into madness as frustration and the strain of poverty began to erode his sanity. After nearly a year had passed without the slightest hint of goat-mating, the man decided in the throes of despair and madness that he would mate with one himself. Perhaps then, he told himself, the other goat would understand. But the goats still would still not mate.
Then one day a passing traveler took pity on the man and offered to help in any way he could. The poor man explained his dilemma, expounding in detail upon every measure he had taken to convince the goats to mate. The traveler listened carefully to his tale of woe, then went over to examine the goats. After a moment, the traveler burst into laughter, rolling on the ground and pounding his fists against the dirt in mirth. The poor man simply stared at his guest in consternation, trying hard to understand what was so amusing. After several minutes the traveler calmed down enough to explain.
"My friend," he said, struggling to restrain his laughter, "These goats are both male. Of course they will not mate. Although this truly makes me wonder where you've managed to get the milk to feed yourself!"
The poor man fled from the room in shame, disappearing into the countryside. He was never seen again.
-ancient Chinese proverb (okay, not really, I made it up)
Shinji Ikari frowned at the textbook in front of him.
Goat sodomy? he thought. What the hell? What does that have to do with the Second Impact?
Following the lead of just about every other student in the classroom, Shinji ignored the teacher's droning voice and checked the page number again. It was page 217, like the professor had said at the beginning of class, but the young man was still at a loss as to what the page's contents might have to do with the subject at hand.
Struck by a wandering thought, Shinji rubbed the place on his forehead where the abstract concept had collided with his physical body and closed the textbook in front of him so he could check its title. The words "Big Book of Bestiality" lay sprawled across the front cover, and Shinji smacked himself in the forehead for not realizing it sooner. This was the book for his third period class; no wonder he could not locate it earlier in the day.
The sudden ringing of the school bell disrupted his thoughts, and Shinji was dragged back to reality by the bustle of his classmates as they scattered from the room or gathered in small clusters to exchange gossip and other idle chit-chat. Shinji ignored them, focusing instead on the desk that had been empty since he had begun attending classes here just over a week ago. Supposedly it belonged to Rei Ayanami, a female student who was also a pilot for NERV, but she had not been to school recently.
The thought of piloting sent a nervous shudder down Shinji's spine, and before he knew it he found himself plunged involuntarily into a flashback.
Flashback
Some Time Previously
Shinji yawned, groggy from being awoken in the middle of the night. Also his head hurt, from where an oblivious young woman had accidentally stepped on him as he lay sleeping at the bottom of stairwell. Since no one had cared enough to remember to assign him sleeping quarters of his own, and since he had been too much of a pansy to inform anyone of this, he had simply wandered around until he found a seemingly quiet and unoccupied corner and slept there.
Terrified and disoriented by the foot pressing down on his face, he jerked to the side and yelped loudly as his crotch slammed into a nearby metal pole. He clutched his wounded manhood, pivoting helplessly in a circle as the offending foot pinned his head to the ground.
Forty-five minutes later, Misato Katsuragi stumbled upon two of them. It was quite a sight, with the helpless young man thrashing beneath the shoe of a bandaged girl while she stared at the wall intently, as if studying something of great interest, apparently oblivious to the plight of the boy beneath her.
"Oh, there you two are," Misato said, smirking. "We've been looking all over for you. Something's come up, and we need you both in the command center immediately.
Rei turned to regard her superior. "Understood."
Rei spun on her heel, much to the dismay of the young man whose face was being ground beneath it, then stepped away and disappeared up the stairs. Shinji groaned again as she stepped on his tender crotch on the way out, but by this time he was starting to get used to the pain.
Misato allowed the boy a few minutes curled up in the fetal position, moaning, before finally helping him to his feet.
"Who was that girl?" Shinji asked after a moment, limping carefully to avoid disturbing his lower extremities. "And why did she step on my head and my pee pee?"
"Her? Oh, that was Rei Ayanami. She works for your father, as a pilot."
Shinji frowned, confused. "A pilot of what?"
Misato just smiled. "Oh, you'll see."
Just then Shinji stumbled on the steps, cracking his forehead against the hard floor. His legs squeezed together awkwardly, replacing the dull, throbbing ache in his loins with fersh, searing agony. Misato allowed him a few more minutes to recover, hauled him to his feet again, and escorted him to the command center.
The intense, throbbing pain between Shinji's legs had diminished somewhat, but he doubted the swelling had gone down yet. Nonetheless, after looking around the crowded command center, he this was not the place to check.
Instead, the young Ikari shifted nervously in place, staring firmly at the ground as he waited for some indication of why he was here. He had heard that NERV's long-distance radar had picked up something large moving in their direction and was waiting for confirmation from the Tokyo-2 radar post, but he still could not figure out just what any of that had to do with his presence being needed in the command center.
Subcommander Fuyutsuki sat in the command chair, massaging the bridge of his nose in an attempt to stem his frustration and irritation as he listened to the caller at the other end of the emergency telephone. His voice was slightly slurred by the effects of first-stage intoxication, but he still spoke loudly and clearly enough to be heard over the throbbing techno beat in the background.
"Yeah, I know it's kinda late, but, uhh… we just detected this big blobbamajigger on the radar, and we figured maybe you guys might like to know. We would have called you sooner, but you see, Tuesday is Rave Night. But it's for sure this time, no screw-ups. We busted out like a whole bottle of Windex on this mutha, and now it's cleaner than the inside of a cockroach's asshole after having a colonic. Well, gotta go. Keep it low and loose, and I'll catch you on the flip side. Outty."
Fuyutsuki could have sworn he heard the sound of fingernails on fabric and the muttered phrase "goddamn crabs" before the line disconnected. He hung up the phone, shook his head for a moment as he desperately collected the shattered remnants of his faith in humanity, and then turned to face the rest of his subordinates.
"Well, it seems we have a real Angel on our hands this time," he said. "Assuming those Tokyo-2 douchebags managed to pull their heads out of their asses long enough to read the radar screen correctly this time."
The others nodded in understanding. Makato Hyuga was the first to speak out.
"So what should we do, sir?"
"The answer to that is simple," a voice interrupted. Fuyutsuki turned to discover that Gendou Ikari had appeared at his side seemingly out of nowhere. The Commander's tone and the serious expression on his face gave Fuyutsuki a tiny glimmer of hope that perhaps this was one of those rare occasions when he was his old, rational self again, even if such instances rarely lasted more than a few hours.
Gendou strode down to the center of the command center and gestured at the radar screen, where the approaching shape was becoming clearer and clearer as it advanced toward NERV Headquarters.
"You see," he began, "our enemy is approaching. This organization was created for one reason, and one reason only: to defend mankind from annihilation. Now that we are faced with this threat, we will do what is required of us. We will engage the enemy in deadly combat, and obliterate them from the face of the Earth."
Gendou folded his hands neatly behind his back, and straightened up even further.
"For great justice," he continued. "Take off every zig."
Fuyutsuki's hopes for a competent commanding officer came crashing to the ground. He resisted the urge to drop to his knees and pound the floor in frustration.
"Zig, sir?" he asked, suppressing his aggravation.
"Zig, zag, whatever," Gendou replied. "Launch the giant robot thingies."
"You mean the EVAs?" Aoba volunteered. "Kick ass."
"Sure, whatever, go for it," Gendou said. "And no, I'm not wearing women's underwear."
Fuyutsuki sighed. "Sir, no one said you were wearing women's underwear."
"That's because I'm not, you perverted freak. Why would you even say something like that?"
"But you said…" the Subcommander began. "Never mind. Shouldn't you be focusing on the matter at hand?"
"The what?"
"The Angel, sir."
"I have no idea what you're talking about. But I do know Metallica kicks ass. 'Master of Puppets I'm pulling your striiiinnngggs… twisting your mind and smashing your dreeeams!'"
"Sir!" Fuyutsuki insisted, cursing the remotest descendents of the individual who first suggested the concept of the chain of command. "I really don't think that's the issue here…"
"Yeah, you're right," Gendou conceded. "Metallica sucks ass. Ozzy's the man. 'I… am… iron man…'"
"SIR!"
Gendou cringed. "What? Stop shouting at me."
"The angel, sir."
Gendou looked confused. "The what?"
"The Angel," Fuyutsuki snapped. "The giant monster capable of annihlilating all of Tokyo-3 and wiping the human race from existence? Sound familiar?"
A look of understanding crossed Gendou's features. "Oh, that."
Fuyutsuki exhaled a sigh of relief. Finally, he thought.
"The what?"
"Damnit, sir…" Fuyutsuki was about eight seconds from completely losing his temper when he noticed Misato and Shinji standing among the assembled staff. "Oh, look, your sissy little crybaby son is here."
"Where?" Gendou asked.
Fuyutsuki turned back to find Commander Ikari standing in the corner, his nose pressed firmly against the wall.
"Over there, sir," Fuyutsuki growled, turning the Commander around to face his offspring.
"Oh, there he is. Shinji! Go get in the whojamawhatsit and fight the giant alien dude."
"What?" Shinji replied, thoroughly confused and embarrassed at being the center of attention.
"The Evamabobber. Go get in it. Then fight the alien thing."
Before Shinji could repeat himself, Hyuga butted in with a report.
"Sir," he said, carefully raising his voice to indicate a matter of some importance. "We're receiving a visual."
"Onscreen," Fuyutsuki commanded.
The display changed from passive radar scans to a video feed. It was blurry, as the air was now heavily choked with dust, but it did reveal with a reasonable degree of clarity that what appeared to be the giant leg of some extraterrestrial monstrosity was now standing over the crushed remains of a White Castle franchise restaurant.
"NOOOOOOOO!" Gendou howled, wracked with anguish. "NOT WHITE CASTLE!"
Upon seeing even the blurry image of the beast's limb, Shinji had gone absolutely pale, turned, and buried his face in Misato's chest like an ostrich hiding its head in the sand. He whimpered, clinging with a death grip around the older woman's waist.
"Randall," Gendou roared, incensed by the destruction of his favorite fast food eatery, "get your wimpy ass in that robot thingie and go fight to what will undoubtedly be your excruciatingly painful and gruesome death."
"My name is Shinji!" he cried, his voice muffled by Misato's ample busom. "And you're crazy if you think I'm going out there to fight something like that!"
"I know what your name is, Timmy," Gendou replied. "Just get out there and stop being so damn worthless!"
"I'm gonna cry!"
Misato stroked her hand along Shinji's brow, and the boy visibly relaxed. Gently, she extracted his face from her sizable melons and looked into his eyes.
"Please, Shinji.," she implored him. "We need you. You're the only one who can defeat it."
"That really doesn't make a lot of sense…" Shinji countered.
"I know," Misato admitted, "but that's the way it works. There is no one else who can do it."
"Well what about Rei?" Shinji asked, gesturing to the enigmatic girl who had been staring intently at a nearby thermostat since her arrival.
"No, wait," Fuyutsuki warned, but it was too late. Rei took two steps, then collapsed to the ground, blood suddenly leaking from beneath her bandages and pooling on the floor.
"Ah, damnit," the Subcommander fumed. "Not again…"
Shinji stood motionless as he watched the rapidly-spreading pool of blood creep in his direction. He felt woozy as the room seemed to spin around him, and he went down faster than the plot of a Lord of the Rings/Evangelion crossover fic. The last thoughts running through his head before it collided with the ground were, "If it weren't for my horse, I wouldn't have spent that year in college…"
After reviving Shinji from his fainting spell, they managed to convince him that he could save the world, and after spending a few more minutes with his nose nestled in Misato's bustline, he was lead down into the Cage, where currently a brutal no-holds-barred NERV Championship match was underway between defending champion Jack the Eunuch and his long-time rival, Wang Long. Ducking a few stray folding chairs, the NERV personnel made their way through the danger zone and into the Evangelion staging area, which, as fate would have it, also happened to be called the Cage.
Upon their arrival, Shinji found himself face to face with the enormous leering visage of what he could only describe as a demon, a large, cruel-looking horn protruding from its forehead. Shinji's eyes rolled back in their sockets, and he toppled to the floor.
A few minutes later the NERV personnel managed to revive him, and with a bit of reassurance from Misato (particularly from two large organs protruding from her torso), they were able to rekindle the spark of confidence he had felt earlier and convince him to pilot the Evangelion.
Shinji climbed unsteadily into the entry plug, turning to regard the others one last time. He opened his mouth, probably to say something along the lines of "want my mommy" or something equally pusillanimous (yes, that's a real word) when his foot slipped unexpectedly in a slimy residue. He lost his balance, racking himself on the lip of the entry plug before plummeting several meters to impact face-first on the cold steel walkway.
Misato rushed to his side, waving her hand in front of his face to see if he was still conscious. After a moment of stunned inactivity, Shinji groaned and opened one eye to regard the NERV officer.
"It… hurts," he whimpered. "It hurts real bad… in the naughty place."
Fifteen minutes later, they finally managed to assist Shinji into the entry plug, secure his restraints, and insert him into the Evangelion. Just as he finally seemed to be calming down, a thick orange liquid began filling the plug.
"EEEEK!" Shinji squealed. "EEEEEK! Help! What is this! EEK!"
Misato's voice crackled over the communications channel. "Relax, Shinji. It's just LCL. It will help you breathe."
Water… you can breathe? A part of Shinji's brain reflected. BRILLIANT!
Wait, another lobe warned. How the hell can you breathe water?
Breathing water, the logical lobes of his brain interjected. DOES. NOT. COMPUTE.
Shinji's mind was on the verge of passing out again from the conflict within, until he suddenly realized that the liquid had filled up over his head, and a fresh wave of panic quickly silenced the internal debate.But it was short-lived, as Shinji's lung capacity, though well-developed by over a decade of shrieking in terror, finally gave out and the liquid filled his lungs. Shinji relaxed, too frightened to even be afraid anymore, but when blackness failed to overcome his senses and instead fresh energy flowed throughout his body, Shinji was pleasantly surprised to find himself undead. Well, not in the vampire/zombie sense, but he still retained all the qualities necessary to be considered alive.
As the shock of non-death wore off, Shinji detected a familiar odor as the LCL particles flowed through his nasal passages. It was a familiar scent, one he instantly recognized in an unpleasant realization. He crinkled his nose.
"It smells… like ass," he decided.
"Quit complaining."
Shinji shrank in his seat. "Sorry."
He looked around, familiarizing himself with his new environment.
"So… how exactly does this thing work?"
Misato shrugged, although Shinji was unable to see it.
"You'll figure it out." She turned to face Ritsuko Akagi and the other technicians. "Launch him."
"But, I-" Shinji protested. Misato quickly killed the communications link, abruptly ending his objections.
Sputtering his misgivings, Shinji's neck jerked forward painfully as the Evangelion rocketed up the launch tube, then screeched to a halt as it emerged into the now-evacuated Tokyo-3 cityscape. The restraints holding the Eva in place detached, and Shinji's swirling vision began to calm itself while his dizziness receded.
"Oh, man," he murmured, trying to straighten up in his seat. "What the hell was that?"
A loud roar caught his attention, and he nervously tried to figure out how he might turn the robot's head. To his surprise, the Eva seemed to respond to whatever he wanted it to do with little more than a thought. He would have called this a pleasant surprise, up until the point where the Eva actually obeyed him and turned its head far enough to bring the enemy he had been sent out to fight into view.
The creature was enormous, easily taller than the highest building in the entire city, and almost as wide. It sported at least a dozen legs sprouting from the amorphous blob that apparently served as its central hub, while nearly twice that number of tentacle-like "arms" protruded in the air, ending in wickedly-curved pincers. It roared again, and charged toward the newly-arrived Evangelion.
Shinji froze, paralyzed by the simple fact that such a creature could even exist in the first place. It was like a joke; nothing this horrifying could possibly be real. It just couldn't. Having decided that the beast was just a figment of his imagination, Shinji turned away to look for his real opponent.
Shinji had fully convinced himself that his enemy was still lurking somewhere else by the time the supposedly imaginary creature reached his position, but his little fantasy world was quickly shattered when several of the Angel's pincer arms took hold of Unit 01 and began repeatedly slamming it into the ground.
In addition to screaming like a girl, Shinji managed to get one small part of his brain to contemplate rational thoughts, like whether the was any way he could possibly hope to preserve his non-death longer than the currently estimated fifteen seconds. And more importantly than that, another part of him was more than a teeny bit curious as to why his body hurt so goddamn much, as though it were him being pummeled instead of the machine he was piloting. A third element was repeating the mantra that Misato had whispered into his ear while trying to coax him into the Eva.
I have mad ninja skillz. I have mad ninja skillz. I have mad ninja skillz…
However, these were only a few small clusters of rebellious brain cells. The rest of his brain had long ago reached a consensus, and was currently embroiled with one single, overriding thought, which it then passed on to his vocal cords:
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH! AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
Shinji's screams easily overwhelmed the voicing coming in over his com system, encouraging him to calm down and suggesting various methods with which he might retaliate against his aggressor. That is, until the Angel seemed to tire of slamming him against the ground and tossed the Evangelion several dozen yards to slam into a nearby skyscraper, and Shinji found himself too dazed to continue screaming. However, as he began to catch his breath and regain some semblance of his wits, the sight of the Angel looming over him nearly sent him into hysterics again. This time, though, he did not get the opportunity. Rather than picking him up again to resume the savage beating, the Angel raised a quartet of its powerful legs into the air and systematically slammed them down into Unit 01's crotch, alternating between them in quick succession so that there was only a brief instant of respite between blows.
Shinji squealed, writhing in his seat, hands clasped around his groin. Reminders that it was not his actual bruised and swollen scrotum being mercilessly pummeled crackled over the com system, but they fell on deaf ears. Shinji simply thrashed in place, wailing and moaning under the assault, his mind too focused on the extreme agony to be bothered with trivial matters such as "thoughts" and "words."
After about fifteen minutes of this, the Angel seemed to tire of the game and lowered its legs back to the ground. Leaning in close to the fallen Eva, it parted its frontmost tentacle arms to the sides. The central mass seemed to shift abnormally, then split apart as a large, beak-like projection emerged, similar in shape to the shell of a large clam and dripping with a slimy, viscous green fluid.
Shinji had just begun to open his eyes when the beak emerged, opening wide to reveal rows of jagged fangs and a large, black, tongue-like organ that seemed to slither about with a will of its own. More of the green fluid dribbled from its gaping maw, and if Shinji had taken the time to look down, he would have noticed that it was eating away at the streets below where it had landed in large, noxious globules.
But Shinji didn't look down. In a moment of sudden clarity, he restrained himself from shrieking and cowering in terror and looked frantically around the cockpit, hammering against various parts of the control panel in an attempt to find the eject button. A bright red lever to his left caught his attention, and he cursed himself for not noticing it sooner. Reaching over, he grasped the handle firmly and pulled.
To his dismay, nothing happened. Shinji took the opportunity to piss himself, then snapped his eyes shut and prepared for another round of screaming and trembling in fear before he was horribly maimed and killed.
Just as he had opened his mouth to unleash another bloodcurdling screech, a sudden lurch of the Evangelion slammed his head against the entry plug wall, and he began to feel odd sensations in his rib cage.
Observers in the NERV control room used their amazing powers of observation to observe a strange panel sliding open in Unit 01's chest. Ritsuko gasped, realizing what was taking place.
From the depths of the Eva's chest cavity came an enormous boxing glove, fixed to the end of a proportionally gigantic spring. The colossal hand slammed into the Angel's maw, shattering teeth and rending flesh as it tore into the creature's interior. The beast sagged, its myriad limbs thrashing for a moment before tumbling limply to the pavement below, and exploded.
"Impossible…" Ritsuko murmered. "He's activated the Progressive Fist!"
The intense light collided with Shinji's vision, and he lapsed back into the cozy darkness.
Back to the Future (errr, crap… Present)
"Hey, newcomer," a voice called out, pulling Shinji from his lengthy flashback. "I don't like you."
Shinji turned to face this new presence, unsure of how to reply. He didn't have to, as his face was met almost immediately by a vicious haymaker. He collapsed to the ground, twitching as miniature Evangelion units danced around his throbbing head.
What was that for? Shinji wondered around the pain. It's not like I stepped on his sister or anything…
"He can be a pretty mean guy sometimes," a little nerdy fellow declared from off to the side. "Especially since his sister is in hospital from getting stepped on by your Evangelion."
Oh, Shinji thought. Shit…
Any further thoughts were quickly annihilated as a savage kick connected with his still-tender gonads. Shinji groaned, feeling the darkness overwhelm him again. Though he would later discover it was simply the result of his bladder emptying itself again, he retreated into the comfortable warmth. Just before he lost consciousness completely, Shinji could have sworn he saw one of the tiny dancing Evangelions flip him off.
So that's chapter two. The next chapter will likely cover the arrival of the Second Child, and after that, who knows? You'll just have to read and find out. Or ignore me and my sad little fic. Whatever.
In closing, I leave you to ponder this: if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, can I distract you with pondering whether or not it makes a sound long enough to relieve you of your wallet and/or assorted valuables?