Neon Genesis Evangelion: Altered Destinies
Launch Thirty Eight
The US branch of NERV were busy, though it also felt a bit like watching the end of the world play out in slow motion.
"France and Germany's representatives to the committee both committed suicide?" Maria Vincennes echoed, surprised.
Her assistant, Sumire Nagara, nodded seriously. "Apparently, Germany's rep was being investigated. He wasn't as careful as he needed to be in moving funds around for SEELE," she noted.
"And he had connections to France," Maria mused.
"That's the theory," Sumire agreed. "Of course it's equally possible they both looked at the situation and decided it was hopeless..."
"Do we know who will replace them?" Maria wondered.
"No idea with France," Sumire admitted, "but rumors out of Germany are that an old warhorse is taking over."
"Hope that won't push Keel to act rashly," Maria sighed. She changed the subject, "How are the pilots doing?"
"Pretty well," Sumire admitted. "Nagisa is synching well with our Evangelion, as is Mayumi. And the modifications to make the Mass Production models pilotable are going well."
"Hmm," Maria nodded.
"Uhm... I've asked Kaworu's friend to join our staff, sort of as a minder for the pilots," Sumire added quickly.
"What?" Maria blinked.
Sumire looked sheepish. "Well, we need someone to do it... and it's not like we could ask an existing staffer to do it. That'd be crazy."
Meanwhile, in Tokyo-3, Misato suddenly sneezed. Loudly.
"Someone's talking about you?" Shinji asked as they ate breakfast.
"Wouldn't she be sneezing all the time?" Ritsuko teased her girlfriend.
"Oh, yuck it up," Misato said wryly.
Back at NERV Nevada, Maria gave her second in command an odd look. "How do we know Hilde's not a plant? She practically came from Keel, after all." she asked.
"She can't really go back to Keel after helping Kaworu escape," Sumire noted reasonably, "if she IS a plant, it's a hell of a cover." She shrugged, "Besides, if we start worrying over who's a SEELE plant, we'd have to fire almost everyone."
Maria sighed, "Point..."
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
ARAEL floated, invisibly watching the world below. It had once had a purpose, a destiny to carry out... but things had changed.
It sensed a fundamental... discontinuity in the world below. Events were not playing out as FORETOLD.
Worse... it could onle sense LILITH.
WHERE WAS ADAM.
It's shining wings moved and twisted around it's body. It's core glowed, hanging in the center of many unfolded wings. It felt profoundly confused...
Invisibly it watched... waiting. For something.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Asuka sneezed loudly.
"Don't get nose goblins in the LCL," Mizsato noted as she supervised the mock combat.
"Eww," Shinji sighed as they fought against a swarm of Mass Production Evangelions.
Kensuke Aida used his Evangelion to punch one in the face, breaking the disturbing smile. Ken knew from talking to his counterpart (long story) that these things had attacked NERV and attempted to trigger an Impact Event. What he didn't know was if that would happen here.
"Remember that they regenerate," Misato cautioned, "if you don't disable the power, they WILL get back up."
"Right," Ken drew his progressive knife and stabbed the core.
"Mana, how's the VR interface?" Misato checked.
"Not bad," Mana said from the cockpit of Jet Alone. She was synched into their VR system, and was helping against the MP Evas. "Look out at 3:00 o'clock. Beam canon, firing!" she radioed a warning to the other pilots.
Everyone scurried aside, then the positron canon now mounted on her shoulder fired. It cut through the enemy like butter, then just as suddenly cut out.
"Hit them while they're down!" Asuka yelled as they charged in to stomp on the wounded.
Rei calmly followed their lead.
"I sometimes think we're a bad example for Rei," Shinji noted wryly.
Misato snorted softly in amusement. "Okay, we'll do one more simulation on a higher difficulty," she told them. "Get ready..."
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Gendo calmly poured himself some low grade vodka and tossed it back. As a basically un-scented booze, he could drink it at work and not get caught.
There was a knock on the door, and Gendo calmly put the bottle in a upper desk drawer. "Enter," he called.
Maya Ibuki came in, nodding. "Sir. Here is the report on repairing the defences," she put the papers on his desk.
"Concentrating on fixing the outer ring, first?" Gendo noted. He didn't add 'again' since it had been fixed, then trashed by Zereul earlier.
"It'll give us some advanced warning if an Angel arrives," Maya said dryly, adding, "especially since I don't know what's coming."
Gendo deliberately hid a wince. Maya had studied the previous Angel attacks and their preperations, and had quire reasonably deduced that he had known what was coming. Part of him wanted to admit that they were clueless as to what Arael or Tabris were going to do...
"Good work," Gendo decided to just ignore it. "Are the pilots ready?" he asked.
"Misato reports the pilots are training hard," Maya noted. "Jet Alone has been fitted with the positron canon, as well. We're hoping it will be effective in a fire support role."
The problem with Jet Alone, Gendo knew, was it's inability to generate a AT field. Against a Angel or Evangelion, it could do nothing unless the enemy's AT field was countered. On the other hand, it WAS a huge and powerful machine, so if you could bring down the AT field, it could then do a lot of damage.
"Carry on," Gendo said, "and keep me informed."
"Sir," Maya nodded and left.
Once she left Gendo brought out the vodka and took another drink. As he sipped, he found himself wondering where the UN rep was...
The hammering on the door answered that. "Enter," he answered.
Kaji entered, his expression grave. "Have you been contacted by the Committee yet?" he asked Gendo briskly.
Gendo looked at him curiously, wondering what he was getting at. "No?" he answered.
"The UN," Kaji said, though they both knew that he really meant Keel and the SEELE cabal, "have appointed a new head to the UN group that is supervising NERV. A high ranking former military type from Germany."
"I'm not going to like this, am I?" Gendo asked mildly.
"She's a real hardass," Kaji agreed. "And is apparently coming here..."
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
The jet left Germany the day before, after a meeting with Keel. It had been a formality, but an important one. They needed to meet face to face to discuss her taking over a seat in SEELE. She was taking over Germany's seat, as well as joining the public panel that oversaw NERV.
"Major General," the young man saluted.
"Retired Major General," the tall, silver-blonde haired woman corrected. "I'm just here as a UN official," she added.
A slightly older, brown haired woman behind her snorted in amusement.
The woman ignored that, "We're on time for arrival?"
"One hour," the man noted, "apparently there will be representatives from NERV waiting for you."
"Hopefully Asuka is there. It's been years since we saw each other," the woman sighed as the young man returned to his seat.
"I'm sure she'll be happy to see you," the other woman smiled.
The older woman turned as she said, "I'm sorry you have to come along with me on this, Visha. I know you prefer retirement..."
Viktoriya Serebryakov smiled wryly, "You know, where you go I go. It was in our vows too, Tanya."
Tanya Degurechaff smiled back as she leaned forward and kissed her lightly. "Thank you," she answered warmly.
To be continued...
Notes: YES that's Tanya from Youjo Senki: The Saga of Tanya the Evil. Or at least the Evangelion universe version of her.