"You cannot be serious! You want us to supply power to that?!"
Asuka was engaged in a slightly heated argument with one of the bridge officers of a naval ship. The crew members surrounding them tried to act as if nothing was happening, but it was hard to concentrate with the arguing in the background. "Listen chubby," Asuka spat in the officer's face, "these orders are from Trieze himself! What place are you in to argue with these commands?"
The officer tried to contain the anger the best he could: "I don't give a damn about the filth you're spitting! If we were to activate that…THING!!! This ship would have no more combat power, let alone enough energy to keep the buoyancy controls running."
Asuka become more exasperated. If she had been in command, she would have already been lunging at his throat; though now she tried her best to keep calm and tried to reason with the stubborn officer. "I'll ask one more time, sign these documents. These orders have been issued by commander Kushrenada himself. I'm surprised you're even arguing with me, since you might as well be going against the entire organization of Oz by refusing to submit to his commands."
The bridge officer's face become more pale, but it seemed as if the war inside him mind wouldn't let him submit to Asuka's will. He looked around for support, but in finding none he turned back to face her, defeated. "Alright, gimme the papers. If you want to risk your life at sea, so be it."
Asuka happily handed him the documents before leaving the bridge. She only had to walk a few meters down familiar corridors before she was walking on one of the naval vessel's decks. As she looked out across the blue, sparkling ocean, she tried to take some time to clear matters.
FLASHBACK
"These are the arrangements:" spoke Trieze, surrounded by his highest officers (and of course, Asuka), "there will be three teams. That's all we can spare with our current resources. One will take the southwest pass, through the Hitakawe Mountains. The second group will take the Richardson road up through the dense farmland directly to the south of this establishment." Trieze used the glass table in front of the generals with lights and colors moving beneath them to show the plans. Small Red and green dots appeared as he spoke, both moving southwards, though about one hundred miles away from each other.
"Who will be leading them?" Asked one, wearing a brown naval cap over one eye.
"Okay Sishio, you take the first group. Roger:…"
"Yes sir."
"You will take command of the second group." Trieze then paused, looking over the detailed map before him prior to finishing his plan. "The third convoy will be the real one. I will be taking charge of it indirectly through Ms. Sorhyu." A few looks towards the other generals gave the impression they didn't like that idea. Nevertheless, they didn't speak up. "Thomas, you are second in command of task force one, Mara for group two. You may now leave."
Four members of the assembly left the room silently after a formal "yes sir". Trieze still waited a few seconds before continuing.
"The rest of you will be individually assigned a squad on the main convoy. We are not sure of their methods, but it is extremely likely the colonies will have a way of tracking the convoys. In that case, there will most certainly be an attack. This is the most important of them all though, so we must be able to have extremely efficient contact between our troops. Any questions?"
A tall woman with black hair stepped forward. "Torusama sir. Why are we traveling over the sea sir? It will be much slower and arduous. Plus," her voice dropped a few degrees as she spoke, "why are you entrusting the task force right into this…girl's hands?"
Trieze looked worriedly at Asuka. Asuka's eyes twitched, but nevertheless she maintained her temper. Trieze, having spent much time around Asuka by now, mentally sighed that she was beginning to show restraint. "The ocean will provide a good view of the surrounding areas on all sides, we will be able to see the enemy before they can attack us. Plus, I do not think that the colonies actually have functioning under-water mobile suits just yet. As for Ms Sorhyu, I hope that you are not jealous?"
The woman was slightly struck by the tone of the commander's voice. "Uh-, no, it wasn't-…"
"It does not matter though, she will not be giving the orders. She will merely be relaying them for me. I believe that this is the end of our meeting then, is it not?"
The heads bowed and gave their formal salute before leaving. Asuka stood behind for a few seconds, not sure if he wanted her to leave too. Just before she left, Trieze stopped her by placing a gloved hand on her shoulder. "Huh? What?"
Trieze looked down at her softly. "Don't pay any attention to those people. It's natural for humans to become jealous of people who get more attention than them."
"Yeah yeah, I know." Asuka began turning around but Trieze stopped her once more.
"I need your word Asuka, that there are no other Evas out there. It would disrupt the plan greatly. Can I count on your word?"
Asuka looked at him for a few moments, struggling herself as whether or not the other Evas were out there or not. "I-…I don't know." Trieze's gaze hardened and she quickly spoke up. "I'm pretty sure that there aren't." She gained confidence as she spoke; "besides, even if there were more, I'm on your side remember, I'd take care of them easily." She made sure that there was no hint of uncertainty in her voice, she wanted to set a good example for the commander.
Asuka felt uneasy speaking this way to her commander. She knew that Shinji and Rei were out there somewhere, but she couldn't be sure that they actually made it or not. Come to think of it, she hadn't spent much time thinking about the whereabouts of her old colleagues.
Trieze smiled warmly at her and Asuka couldn't help but gleam. Trieze then bowed his head slightly before speaking in a different voice. "I haven't told you about my daughter yet have I?"
Asuka looked slightly perplexed at Trieze now. She tried to search his face for any hints at what he was trying to get at. "Your…daughter? What about her? You never told me you had a daughter."
Trieze bowed his head ever more slightly. "She's very young…and-…I'm sorry. But all this time I think I have been-…"
"Don't worry about it okay?" Asuka smiled again, hoping Trieze wouldn't start getting sentimental. She was totally freaked out by it since she was so used to commanders being all cool and vigilant at all times.
Trieze looked at her before smiling genuinely again. "Ah, thank you. I'm sorry, let's go catch out flight. We have more preparations ahead of us." Trieze barely heard Asuka give a grumble.
END OF FLASHBACK
Asuka flipped her head slightly to get her hair out of her face while she looked two carriers over. She was definitely impressed by the fleet, she had never seen so many ships in her life. It was similar to the time she was en route to Japan after being transferred from the German NERV branch. Though, this time there were three times as many ships, many times more powerful and the ship containing her Evangelion was at least the size of two aircraft carriers.
Asuka smiled. Ever since she had become part of the organization Oz, she felt like this was always the place she belonged. NERV used to be the only place for her, but she found a new purpose with greater achievements in this organization. There was no ruthless commander, she hardly risked her life in battle, she still made new friends, she didn't always have to go to sync tests and her education was recognized: giving her the opportunity to teach people rather than be taught.
There was nothing NERV had to offer that she didn't have here. Asuka smiled as she gazed at the ocean around her.
What about Shinji?
Asuka almost flinched as that thought came through her head. She was surprised it even did go through her mind, she looked behind her unconsciously hoping that nobody saw her action.
She didn't care about Shinji at all; he was whiny and wimpy, the only thing he was good for was serving her breakfast in the mornings. Plus, there weren't many other people in that universe that she cared less for than Ayanami, the nerve Rei showed to her was enough to drive Asuka into her ever so famous rages.
Yet, as always, as soon as thoughts from her past came to the surface of her mind, she began to feel empty. She hated it so much, because it was in direct conflict with what she was thinking. She didn't want to believe in any ways that she was lying to herself. Asuka, suddenly caught in two arguing sides of her personality, hastily kicked one of the rails and stormed back into the ship to her quarters, almost knocking a friendly corporal into the sea.
Shinji looked around very uncertainly. He had been getting more confident over the past weeks, getting more used to his new surroundings and learning from people he met. Though, he still couldn't get rid of the uncomfortable feeling he got when being around too many unknown people.
The only fact that comforted him was that he was standing beside Rei, which put him more at ease than being left alone in a somewhat hostile environment. There were many different ranked officers surrounding a round table with different colored objects being projected by light above them. Trowa and Quatre weren't leading them any more, it was up to the superiors now. Shinji was hoping he could have stood closer to them, instead of right beside a man almost twice his size, but they had to stand close to the higher ranked officers.
"Okay men," Shinji glanced somewhat at Rei who stood indignantly, "we have our orders. How we execute them though, is our decision." Shinji noticed a few of the officers smirk. "We have some new members with us for the remainder of this battle. This will undoubtedly increase our odds after our last loss."
There was some murmuring, then one of the generals spoke up. "Sir, do we know where the enemy is? When are we going to exact revenge?"
The man, wearing dark blue clothes, was substituting for the commander during this time. He took a quick look at some of the notes he had on the table beside him before speaking again. "This is not out of revenge, but for our survival. Now, we do know where the enemy is, though the only problem is the fact that there are three separate targets. We are wasting time as we decide which one to attack. They are all en route to a certain destination, but our spy satellites will not be able to point them out for much longer. Storm warnings are being issued, so there will be heavy cloud cover."
"Three forces sir?"
"Three, it's obvious two are probably a diversion. One of these convoys must hold their precious secret weapon, so that is the one we must either capture or destroy. The plan is on the documents in front of you. Any questions?"
One man leaned forward slightly into the light. Wrinkles were thickly written into the sides of his mouth and eyes. "I have a question." There was a short pause as he seemed to take a few breaths. "I heard rumors of our forces now utilizing our own secret weapons. Does this relate to the fact that we have four new members present with us today?"
"Yes and no," sighed the sub-commander somewhat exasperatedly, "yes, because it may be true, and no because I don't have the authorization to give you details. Just trust us that you will be victorious over Oz in the next few hours." After that bowed to the generals, and they respectfully saluted him.
Shinji and Rei left the briefing room right after Trowa and Quatre. What they found was that the four of them had been led into a smaller room where the sub-commander was already waiting for them.
"We have some quick matters to discuss, please sit down." The sub-commander mentioned to a few chairs circled around him and the four members sat down. Shinji noticed he was sweating and tried to calm himself. He looked around the bleak office, but noticed nothing out of the ordinary, so took to focusing on the sub-commander himself. "I hope you have looked at your documents?"
Trowa replied for them. "Most of them, yes."
"Okay, do you need any questions answered? I know that there are some you weren't willing to discuss in the other room."
"About the plans," began Quatre, choosing to take the initiative, "Why are you splitting us up? The original plan was to figure out which was the real convoy."
The sub-commander looked taken aback before answering somewhat tensly: "we were receiving information from your contacts inside the organization. We were not so lucky in having our own. It just so happens that whoever it was feeding information to us decided to ignore any requests but those by you."
Quatre almost laughed while Trowa actually smirked at the comment. Meanwhile, Shinji looked back and forth confused. Ayanami was also slightly confused, but she did not show it. Shinji took the moment the ask one of his own questions. "Um, how come you have put the two…ummm…Gundams, right? Together, but myself and Rei have to work solo?"
"I am sorry about this," began the sub-commander as he flipped through some of his notes, "we knew that you may not agree, but it is the only way. It was suggested that the secret Evangelions are more powerful than the Gundams. Plus, Ms Ayanami took the liberty of confiding to us the fact that your Evangelion can not operate under water. Seeing as the Gundams are much more suited to fighting under-water, we had pretty obvious choice of who to assign where!"
Shinji looked at Ayanami, though her expression was unreadable. She saw him staring at her. "If these people are crucial to our plan to leave this universe, then we must trust them."
"Still!" Started Shinji. "You didn't even ask me? How much did you tell them?"
"Only that," answered the sub-commander, "it was the only crucial information we needed. Please excuse us, we will ask you as well, during our next discussion." Shinji felt more at ease with that, he wanted to be protective of his Evangelion. Still, how could Ayamani betray his trust like that?
He would have liked to have talked to her, but the meeting was adjourned. He left without a word.
The colony forces wasted no time in preparing for battle.
"What do you mean, I can not contact him?"
Dr. J walked forward through the shadows to a slightly aggravated looking Master O.
"What seems to be the problem?"
Master O turned around and let out a breath. "Good day, I didn't see you come in."
"Yes, how are the communications working?"
"There's an encryption. The closest command line we've found only lead to four or five general's quarters. They tried to trace our lines instead of negotiating, so we had to cut them off." Master O sighed. "This may take longer than we had anticipated."
Doctor J frowned through his spectacles; "that will not do. If we delay too long we will miss our opportunity. If these actions continue too long all will be lost. I will assign some more techs to your division; we need to get the codes cracked quickly."
"I understand, but this was never possible during our earlier attempts. Now that we cannot even get a direct confirmation on the whereabouts of the commander of Oz, it seems nearly impossible."
Dr. J smiled; "Nothing is impossible my friend."
Both old men smirked behind their glasses, before Dr. J turned around and stepped back into the shadows.
"These events will soon be drawn to an end."
A/N: This chapter may not have introduced any new elements yet, but the next will. I'm just working out a few minor details before I come up with some more original stuff!
Thank you to my prereaders Denissud and Steve VADER.
The chapters may start flowing a bit quicker now, so waits won't be as long!