Rebuild of Third Genesis
Chapter Sixteen
Misato watched her three pilots on the monitors, destroying simulated Angels. Mari was the most aggressive, while Rei seemed to be the most cautious. Asuka, oddly, was in the middle and had defaulted to commanding the unit. Not that Mari didn't give her grief over that, but she MOSTLY followed along. It was a interesting dynamic, actually, and she wished she could keep watching, but there was more to do.
Once the girls left the simulators Misato met them on the catwalk. "I hate to end your fun, but the new versions of the plug suits are ready. Would you mind trying them on?" the woman in a mid-thigh length skirt and blouse asked
Rei smiled, "Sure."
"It's about time," Mari said with a cocky grin. The young woman had been 'borrowing' a older plugsuit of Shinji, and it bothered her a bit. Stepping into dead man's boots came to mind, or something like that.
Asuka hesitated, thinking of the scars that she still carried. "All right," she made herself smile as Rei looked up at her warmly.
"Thanks," Misato directed it mostly to Asuka. She knew how difficult some of this must be for her, even after her return to the simulators. "Let's get going," she leads them out of the simulator area, down the hallway to an elevator.
The room they arrived in was a modified changing room, and when Asuka looked over at the three plug suits she frowned slightly at their odd, off-gray color. "They aren't individually colored?" she asked Misato.
"It's a specially made 'smart' fabric," Misato explained, "not only will it mold itself to your body, but it will also change colors based on whatever you input."
"Not bad," Asuka fingered the soft material, "but I'll stick with my red design."
"Could mine be blue?" Rei asked softly.
Asuka raised an eyebrow slightly, while Misato kept her expression perfectly blank. "I don't see why not," Misato managed to smile.
"Hey, you can mix colors too," Mari noted, touching controls and tinting the hanging plugsuit green, mostly, but with white leggings and tan strips across her breasts.
Misato walked over to the door and turned back for a moment to say, "I'll let you get changed." With that, she was off.
As soon as the door shut, Rei calmly slipped the blue dress over her head, folding it up carefully dressed only in her bra and panties. She reached back, her motion pushing her breasts forward and unsnapped the bra, releasing them.
With a loud gulp Asuka turned, stripping her own uniform off quickly. 'I was practically ogling her,' she blushed, setting her pants, shirt and jacket down in a pile. A soft touch on her back startled her, and she turned to meet Rei's gaze.
"Huh," Mari smirked, then stripped off her uniform, slipping the loose plugsuit on then hitting the control pn her wrist to make it vacuum seal to her body.
Asuka growled, swiftly pulling on her plugsuit and hesitating as her fingers brushed the color controls. Maybe it was time for a change? After some thought she added black leggings to her orange/red plugsuit, then white sleeves on her arms. Different, but still familiar enough.
Rei, thankfully, did not copy Shinji's design, going for a light blue with white highlights. "What do you think?" she asked innocently.
"Hot," Mari said with a smirk.
Asuka ignored that as she reassured Rei, "You look fine."
"Thank you," Rei smiled back warmly, looking pleased.
Mari stretched, glad the suits moved like skin, more or less. "Hey Asuka," she asked, "do these suits fel a bit different than the old ones?"
"Yeah, a bit," Asuka agreed after a moment's shifting around in her own suit. "Wanna ask Misato about it?" she wondered.
Misato nodded once they met her out in the hall. "The suits have been upgraded to light armor," she told them, "they can resist knives and fire, and are somewhat bulletproof."
"Somewhat?" Rei asked mildly.
"They'll stop bullets and disperse the impact," Misato explained, "so they might still hurt you, but will hopefully not actually kill you."
Asuka hesitated then decided just to ask, "Inspired by the attack on NERV during Third Impact?"
"Pretty much," Misato admitted frankly, looking kind of uncomfortable. "Shinji was nearly killed several times when we were running through the halls being chased by soldiers," she explained, "If the suits had been armored at the time..."
"Nice, maybe I'll go antagonize some UN troops," Mari drawled.
"It won't protect you from headshots," Rei noted dryly.
'Now, was that Rei making a joke, or...?' Asuka wondered. "Well, it's nice to have plugsuits, but are the Evangelions any closer to being operational?"
"I keep asking Ritsuko that, but she's been distracted with some Magi issues," Misato shrugged. "Looks like you'll have to keep practicing for now."
"Yeah, yeah," Mari sighed. "Come on," she told the others, "I want to see who can kill the Angels the fastest."
Misato sighed as she watched Asuka lecturing Mari. 'Wonder if Asuka realizes how much Mari is like she was when she first arrived?' she mused. Her watch beeped and she jerked, realizing she was going to be late for the meeting with the UN rep.
Satoko Shinden was walking towards Misato's office just as Misato was arriving, the gren haired woman's face lighting p a bit as she saw her. "I was worried I missed you," she noted with a smile.
"I was showing off the new plugsuits to the kids, lost track of time," Misato admitted as she unlocked the door to Gendo's old office and led her inside.
The two were developing a professional and personal relationship, one built on their meeting during the madness following Third Impact. They worked together in the frantic weeks after the bombing of Tokyo-3, and developed a strong respect for each other. However Satoko was now the representative of their bosses in the UN, making things rather more complicated.
"How did they like them?" Satoko asked curiously as she followed Misato in.
"Over all pretty happy, I think," Misato smiled as she sat down on a battered couch she had dragged into Gendo's old office. The damn place looked like a crypt too much anyway, so along with some carpet she had brought the couch in too, along with a coffee table.
Satoko sat a bit gingerly, then sighed in relief when the couch didn't collapse. Obviously she hadn't seen much of Misato's usual living conditions. She sat forward slightly as she said, "I got the latest numbers from the UN. They;re willing to finance the reconstruction of two Evangelion, at this point. And they're begging you to do it cheaper than Gendo did it."
"Begging?" Misato snorted.
"Well, not quite that bad," Satoko conceded, "but money is tight with rebuilding after the impact events, as well as our budget for closing up other NERV branches."
"We could just follow the US lead and let the countries take the facilities," Misato said sourly. She shook her head, "I'm pretty sure we'll come in cheaper than Gendo. Possibly a lot cheaper, if the information we dug up was right."
"Oh?" Satoko looked eager.
"Gendo was padding the accounts pretty hard, according to the files we extracted," Misato revealed, "which I guess explains how he kept his black projects financed."
"Makes sense," Satoko nodded.
Misato frowned, "What's this I hear about those SEELE nuts?"
"It it helps it's on the US side," Satoko answered willingly, "it seems the US reprsentative to SEELE did not want to go down easy. He had a 'scorched earth' failsafe that went off after he was killed."
"Fuck," Misato swore softly. "What was it?"
"Black market nuke," Satoko said tiredly, "we think from eastern Europe, but we're not exactly sure. Anyway, he had been holed up in New Vegas since the SEELE news was leaked, using a well paid private army to keep himself alive. It looks like either his troops turned on him, or he got tired hoping the government would rescue him."
"If we'd had the Evangelions functioning...," Misato started darkly.
"What, would you catapult them to the United States?" Satoko snorted. She shook her head as Misato looked at her and firmly said, "No, there was nothing you could have done, Evangelion or no Evangelion."
"I guess so," Misato conceded reluctantly. She actually pouted a bit, "I would just love to get hold of at least one of the SEELE cabal and question them."
"You think there's still secrets they're keeping?" Satoko asked.
Misato made a frustrated gesture. "Yes and no. I mean... there is still SO much we don't know about Second Impact, NERV, Evangelion. All of it, really," she said. "And all I have for answers are the still mostly encrypted files of Gendo Ikari."
"No luck cracking them?" Satoko leaned a bit closer to Misato.
"Just bits and pieces," Misato sighed. "The Magi are chugging away at them... assuming Ritsuko fixed them yet, anyway."
Satoko gently patted Misato's arm, smiling at her. "If it helps any I think you're doing a hell of a job," she said.
"Thanks," Misato smiled back. "You too, really. I think juggling the city rebuilding and keeping n eye on things here must be exhausting."
"Eh, it's just paperwork," Satoko waved it off, even as she blushed a bit.
Misato found herself fondly noting, 'Damn, she is cute when she blushes.' She stopped and blinked, 'Where did THAT come from?'
"You okay?" Satoko asked. "You're awfully pale all of a sudden."
"Just a odd thought," Misato smiled wryly.
To be continued...
Notes: Yeah, I'm putting the pilots in Rebuild of Evangelion plugsuits. I liked the designs. Besides, I'm amused to imagine someone later trying to get Mari into the hot pink plugsuit and having her tell them to go to hell.
