Anyone Can Be a Pilot

by Thuktun Flishithy

Everyone has their problems they face being a pilot. For Shinji, it's trying to prove his worth to everyone, especially his father. For Rei, it's trying to connect with the world around her through Eva. For Asuka, well, a book could be written on her problems. As for me? Well, my problem is that I'm a rat. Crossover with Ratatouille.

1. Chapter 1

You know, it's times like these that I need to reevaluate what life choices I made to get me here.

And by here, I mean inside of a 40-meter tall biomechanical superweapon that's the world's only real defense against abominations that don't belong in this world, while one of said abominations has it by the head and the pilot is screaming.

It's pretty clear that I need to reflect on my issues, right? I mean, someone who doesn't have any issues wouldn't be here. That kid, the one who's screaming in the control chair? He definitely has some issues. Buuut, something tells me his issues are pretty different from mine. Why, you might ask?

Well, first of all, I'm a rat.

鼠

Honestly, I should've known I'd get into trouble as soon as I was born here.

As I grew up, I began to realize that "NERV" -that's what the humans running about everywhere call it- was not a normal place. Especially not for rats to build a nest in. My dad always complained about all the strange things going on, things he never had to deal with "back upside" when he was a young rat in an old apartment building.

"Look at that," he'd always complain, pointing to some new cyrogenics tube or electrified railing we'd have to avoid. "You never had to deal with that back upside."

That's my dad, complaining about everything. You'd think from all the things he had to say about it, he'd hate the place, but I know that if he actually did, he would've taken the colony somewhere else a long time ago. Fact is, aside from a few things we have to avoid, NERV is great for us. It's always the perfect temperature, there's always food to steal -and despite what Dad says, it is stealing- and we're safe.

Yeah, for a place built by humans, there's not an awful lot of them. And there are so many big pipes and vents and access tubes, places that they never go into, that we pretty much have a full run of the entire complex. We knew NERV even better than they did, at least that's what it felt like.

So yeah, that's home for me. I know that's a strange place to grow up in, but that's the thing about growing up in strange places- they don't feel strange. To me, it was just home. It was my entire world, and what a world it was.

Sometimes, it'd be easy to forget that we didn't own the place.

"Never go near the humans," Dad would always warn us, and me especially. He must've smelled it in me. "They're dangerous creatures."

I knew that Dad was telling the truth, yet I still couldn't help but be fascinated by them. I always watched them from the vents and cracks in the ceiling as they finished yet another construction project, or worked machines that did things I couldn't even guess at. Humans didn't just survive; they lived. They made things. I mean, they made the very place I was living in!

All of this place, this massive labyrinth of metal and glass, simply didn't exist before they came along. They looked at dirt and rock and thought, "I can make something from this". And then they did.

When it's put like that, why wouldn't I want to know about the people that made my world?

But it wasn't until an accident that I saw the human I wanted to learn about the most. The one who created the most.

鼠

Now, you think it'd be my burning curiosity for the human world that would've driven me to the office, but truth be told? It... was my stomach.

I've always had a very sensitive sense of taste and smell. My brother Emile thought it was a gift. My dad, ever the rat, thought it was something I needed to overcome, except for poison-testing. Rats can't be picky eaters, he'd always say.

In most places that'd probably be the case, but as I've already established, NERV is not a normal place. There was so much good food lying around, not the trash that Dad had us collect, and there would always be forgotten or unwanted scraps, so who would notice if I took a few crumbs?

The best place to get it was this one office in particular. It belonged to a rather important-looking human with blonde hair. Well, she definitely wanted to be blonde, but I could smell the hair dye before I even got into the office, mixed with the stench of tobacco. She was seemingly in that office every hour of every day, but half of the time she was sleeping, face planted on the desk. Honestly, she was a bit of a mess, and I know that's rich coming from a rat.

But a mess had uses. Especially the half-eaten snacks she left lying around. Some days, it'd be nothing but sugary pastries, and then on others when she wanted to try and maintain her figure, it'd be fresh fruit and seaweed. Both were great scores for me. I could grab as many grapes and chocolate cookie sticks as I wanted, and she'd sleep right through it.

Hey, at least I always washed my hands with the disinfectant bottle she had on her desk before I got all handsy with her food.

One night, however, as I crept out of the slightly loose grate in the air conditioning above, something was different. Dr. Akagi -at least that's what the name on the door was- normally turned off the big machine on her desk before slumping down for a nap, but this time, she'd forgotten to do that. On the glass screen, I saw a human woman's face, her brilliance lighting the dim room.

I was still really young then, and I didn't know anything about these machines. What they did, how they did it. I honestly thought there was a small human in there, frozen. I kept on gawking at her, as I cautiously began to stuff my face with a Kit-Kat bar I found.

Then Dr. Akagi stirred in her sleep, and I froze. She didn't wake, but she accidentally pressed something on her keyboard, and the frozen woman came to life. I hid behind the wrapper, expecting her to scream "rat!", but it didn't come. Instead, she spoke in a soft, but utterly enrapturing, voice.

"-as Second Impact has proven beyond a doubt, it is more easy to destroy, than it is to create. A city that took a thousand years to grow may be destroyed in a second. This truth has broken many, for through the pain they cannot see the next truth. That it is more powerful to create, than it is to destroy."

I poked my head above the wrapper to look at the screen. She wasn't looking at me, but in that moment, I thought she was speaking directly to me.

"The Evangelion project is the ultimate proof of that. Its construction is far more difficult than the destruction that prompted it. We have had to build things we didn't think possible, simply to realize a greater impossibility. And in that, those accomplishments, and Eva itself, will be the rebuilding of the world. We all have that power in us, to create and build. It's in me, and it's in you."

I would later learn that this was just a little video she made for new hires to the Evangelion program, but for little Remy, it was like the voice of God telling me what to do. I looked at the little name on the bottom of the screen.

Yui Ikari.

That seemed familiar to me, but I couldn't figure out why. Not until my eye caught one of the books in Dr. Akagi's personal library. On the Macro-Structure of the Super-Solenoid Engine, by Dr. Yui Ikari.

There it was. The key to the passion that would be my future. I didn't know most of the words on that spine, or what an Evangelion was, or how it was going to fix the world. But I wanted to. I wanted to create things, just like her.

I wanted to be just like Yui Ikari.

鼠

From that day on, I didn't just go to the office to fill my stomach, but my brain. Half the time, I didn't even steal any scraps, forgoing eclairs and donuts for essays like A-10 Nerve and Pilot Interface- A Primer and AT-Field and the Square Cube Law. I read in the dark, keeping my ears open for any noise from my unwitting host. When I found her calendar, I used it to know which days she would be at conferences -whatever those were- and took advantage of the time to read even more.

Day in and day out, I was studying what Yui left. Essay after essay, volume after volume. When I couldn't understand something, I'd go to other offices and look for books there to help me figure it out. And it was all so fascinating. Fields that were universes unto themselves! Machines that could link minds! A giant artificial being as big to a human as humans were to me! I still didn't know what it was all for, but that didn't matter then.

But the most captivating things were the videos. Dr. Akagi had a whole stash of them kept under lock and key in a hidden compartment in her desk. I don't know why she would hide them, but they were easy enough to get when you're a rat watching her stash all of her secret stuff away. When she was away, I'd pull the discs out and pop them into her computer -which I finally understood as a machine- to watch.

There wasn't a lot of important information in there. The reason why I kept watching them was because of the passion with which Yui would dispense it. She'd talk for a long time about things like life, the universe, and her own efforts to understand it all. The more I learned through her books, the greater I could sympathize with that passion, and feel the burn to rebuild in my little rat heart.

When I was back in the colony, in my bed, I'd dream of piloting the Evangelion, like she described it. I'd imagine I was sitting in the seat, working the yokes and thinking how to move the way she instructed.

Little did I know how close to reality that silly daydream was.

鼠

"Why are you carrying the stuff like that?" Emile asked.

"Like what?" I asked back, as we padded down the access shaft.

Emile and I were on scrap duty today. There was always abandoned materials in construction sites that the humans didn't need, but we did. I liked scrap duty. It felt like one of the only ways to express the fire Yui lit in me was to help set up new furniture and fixtures in the colony.

"In your hands. You have a mouth, you know."

"Yeah, and I don't want to ingest something I shouldn't." I shook the bundle of wires and bolts in my hands. "Do you know how many harmful substances are in these scraps? Like, like microplastics. Did you know that a human eats about a credit card's worth of plastic every week?"

"No, but we're rats. You couldn't even eat a whole credit card if you wanted to."

"I mean, you could, though," I said, easing the small tension.

Emile chuckled at that, clearly happy with the compliment. He had a cloth between his teeth, using it to drag his scrap along. When we passed a seam on the shaft's grating, it clinked, and my ears perked.

"What did you find, anyway?" I asked.

"I dunno, just some human stuff," my brother replied.

"Can I see?"

"Uh, sure?"

I opened the bag, and my suspicion was concerned. I looked his way excitedly, holding the small machine in my hands.

"Emile, you found a penlight! And it's not broken!"

"Okay...?" he replied, giving me a worried look. "And that's good because...?"

"Because we can use this to make some light in the colony. Don't you want to be able to see better in there?"

"I mean, I guess? I don't know if Dad's gonna like it."

"Oh, c'mon. Even Dad likes to be able to see where he's going, right? Imagine this strung up in the dining hall."

It was then that I noticed it was a bit light for a penlight. Unscrewing the cap, I looked in.

"Something wrong?" Emile asked.

"No battery," I said. When his face blanked on that, I added, "We need one to make light."

"Ah well, at least it sounded like a good idea," he replied, clearly trying to hurry along before his little brother got him in trouble.

Of course, I wasn't going to be set back by that.

"Follow me, I know where we can get one." I dropped my scrap and began scurrying down the access shaft. "Let's go!"

Behind me, Emile let out a weary groan, and padded after me.

It was a bit before we arrived at the air vent that led into Dr. Akagi's office. Emile seemed much more content enjoying the cool breeze from the air conditioner than I was, and it took some coaxing before he followed me through the loose gap in the grating. Jumping down, we landed quietly on a stack of papers. The office was, as expected, empty.

"I don't like this, Remy," he said, looking around. "We're not supposed to bug humans here. What if one comes in?"

"Oh please, Dr. Akagi is away at a meeting with the Marduk Institute," I replied. "Now wait here. I'll get the battery."

"Wait, how do you know that?" Emile called after me as I scurried towards the long end of the desk.

"I read her calendar," I replied.

Bracing my arms on the desk proper, I grabbed the little -well, little by human standards- rung of the drawer with my feet and pushed as hard as I could. Slowly, the drawer opened, and I hopped in.

"Wait, you read? Like you read human stuff? I don't think Dad would like that."

"What Dad doesn't know, doesn't hurt him." I rummaged through the office supplies. "And believe me, these books are nothing but stuff Dad doesn't know."

"C'mon," Emile groaned. "I don't like this stuff. Bugging humans, and, and reading, and definitely not lying to Dad."

"Well, this light's gonna make up for that." I found the battery I was looking for, and emerged triumphant from the drawer. "Now we can go."

At least Emile was keen on that. We began making our way back to the grating when the door opened, and we instinctively dove for the shadows. Light flooded the room as Dr. Akagi stepped in, followed by a smaller human with brown hair.

"The Third is expected to arrive tomorrow at noon for orientation," Dr. Akagi said. "The Commander wants us to move forward with preparing Unit One for a field test."

"Already, senpai?" the smaller human asked.

So her name is Senpai?

To my side, Emile was trying to quietly scoot to the grating. I began to follow, only to pause. Dr. Akagi said "Unit One". That was an Evangelion unit, wasn't it? I listened further.

"-fix the joint error in the knee by tonight," Senpai was saying. She paused to light a cigarette. "Finally, we'll see Dr. Ikari's work come to fruition."

"If only she was here to see it herself. I never met her."

"Neither did I," Dr. Akagi admitted, taking a puff. "She's been dead nearly eleven years, now, hasn't she?"

In that moment, it was like the world was tumbling down. The flashlight, the danger, even Emile, all forgotten.

Yui Ikari... is dead?

When both of them looked my way, their eyes wide, I realized I hadn't said that in my head.

"Gah! Rat!" Dr. Akagi shrieked, pointing.

Uh-oh.

It was utter chaos in the next few moments after that. I dove under an open pad of schematics. Emile, who had been making a valiant effort of squeezing back into the vent, fell back out with a shriek of his own and sent papers flying everywhere. I guess my brother's misstep was over the line for Dr. Akagi, because she promptly turned a light shade of green -something I didn't know humans could do- and collapsed into the arms of the smaller human.

"Senpai!" The smaller one cried, then held up her wrist to her mouth. "Section Five, we have a Class Four biohazard in Dr. Akagi's office!"

"Uh, Remy," Emile asked, leaning back up from the mess he made on the desk, "what does that mean?"

"It means run!"

And so we ran. Emile hopped down from the desk, and I followed after him, holding the schematics above me. For camouflage, or to serve as a shield from whatever the humans threw at me, I still don't know. Maybe I was just being stupid.

We ran right out the front door, ran right past the still-green doctor and her companion, and ran into the hall. I'd never actually been in the halls before, not when the lights were still on. Everything looked so bright and harsh, and it didn't help that they had just cleaned the floors, and the smell of cleaning products were burning into my nose.

Then I felt the floor vibrating, that tell-tale rumble of a lot of boots, and I skidded to a stop. Emile did the same, then began scurrying to an open panel in the hallway, squeezing his fat butt through. I followed after him, just in time to hear the boots come to a stop. Through the metal walls, I heard a hurried conversation, and I tugged on Emile's tail to stop. We huddled together between some wires, trying to stay quiet.

"What exact Class Four, Doctor?"

"Rats," Dr. Akagi said, clearly having woken back up. Her voice was shaky. "If there's two, there's more. A colony of them can cause malfunctions in vital systems- as far as I'm concerned, they're a threat to our survival. We need to find them."

"Remy?" Emile asked, only to be shushed by me.

"Yes, Doctor," the same voice said. "Where did you see them last?"

"I saw them exit the office," she lied. Probably didn't want to admit she fainted. "They must be..."

She trailed off, and even though I couldn't see her through the wall, I still felt her eyes fall on the open panel.

"In there!" she barked.

"Run! Again!" I squeaked at Emile.

There was a hole in an air vent within the wall, chewed out by other foragers in the colony a while back, and we squeezed into it. Just in time, too- when I looked back, I saw a gloved human hand trying to grab at us through the open panel.

"We need to tell Dad about this!" Emile said, scurrying down the vent.

"But we might lead them back to the colony!" I protested.

When the vent behind us shut, however, I realized we didn't really have a choice. We kept on running, scampering and scurrying and sliding through vents, atop pipes, through chewed insulation. And all the while, I could hear Dr. Akagi and the others shouting, somehow tracking us. Sometimes a wall panel would be torn away, and a net would try to scoop us up.

At some point, it stopped, but that just made us run even faster.

It wasn't long before we were back in the main space for the colony, which was situated above one of the massive main conduits that powered the whole place. Dad was there, watching the other foragers set up the food pile for tonight's dinner when we came running over.

"Remy? Emile?" he asked, looking rather confused. "What happened?"

"I think we need to evacuate the colony," I panted.

"A human saw us," Emile said.

Dad gave us a fatigued, knowing look. "Listen, kids, we all get spotted sometimes. If we had to evacuate every time that happened-"

He didn't have time to finish before a ventilation grate in the floor -which, I suppose, is their ceiling- popped open. Two gloved hands gripped the edge of the opening as they pulled their owner up.

"I assure you I can handle this now, Maya," a familiar voice was saying. A blonde head bobbed into view. "That was just..."

She fell silent as she saw the colony, and everyone saw her. Her two eyes met with hundreds of ours as she took in the sight of our home.

Then, she turned an even more impressive shade of green, and her head sank back down. For a moment, there was only silence.

"Evacuate the colony!" Dad barked. "To the tunnels!"

Utter chaos. The entire colony began scrambling to the escape routes Dad insisted we plan out years ago, in case we were ever found. Nothing was taken. No food, no toys or tools or anything we had made. Only the fur on our backs as we fled.

I was at the big water coolant pipe when the grate opened again, and I looked back to see a human -though he looked more like a monster in the suit he was wearing- throw a hissing can of green gas into our space. Dad shoved Emile in first, then me, then jumped in just in time to avoid the gas. The water was a roaring surge, dragging us swiftly down deeper into the complex.

Well, some of us were going faster than others.

"Remy?" Dad called, him and the others far ahead of me. "What's taking?"

The answer was clear- I still had the thick stack of schematics with me, slowing me down. I was clinging to it desperately, and I couldn't tell if it was out of fear or some sense of stubbornness. What I could tell, though, was that at this rate I was going to be left behind.

"C'mon, son! Swim, son, swim!" Dad called.

"You got this, little brother!" Emile added.

I tried to swim, I really did. But I was still holding on to the schematics as I did, front paws paddling as I tried to catch up to them. As the angle steepened, it seemed like I was going to make it, gravity being the great equalizer it is. But before I could, the flow redirected. Their section of the pipe shut, cutting them off from me, and I was swept in a different direction.

鼠

The second fainting spell came with a splitting headache. Ritsuko pressed an icepack gracefully -and hastily- provided by Maya to her temple as she watched Section Five agents climbing in and out of the ventilation grate that led into the seeming heart of the rat nest. Based off the looks on their faces, distorted by the plastic hazmat masks, she could tell they were just as confused.

"Senpai," Maya said, rather unnecessarily holding her up by the elbow, "are you sure you saw what you said you saw?"

"Maya, I have three PhDs, two of which are in fields that didn't exist fifteen years ago. I work with forty-meter biomechanical titans that are to save the human race from alien beings of godlike power. So believe me when I tell you about the rat city, please."

"As in, there were just a lot, or...?"

"As in, they had dining halls, bunk beds, tiny matchstick fires, and I wouldn't be surprised if there was a rat city hall." She watched as the agents began shoving said evidence into plastic bags, and cleared her throat. "Did we get them?"

"Sorry, Doctor," one of the agents said, apologetically. "Not a single body."

"Check to see what routes they could have taken. We need this entire colony exterminated."

"Senpai, isn't this a bit much?"

"Maya, think about what rats eat. Now think about how the most crucial systems in NERV are biological in nature. They might chew into the MAGI. Or infest one of the Evas like maggots."

The young woman shuddered. "That sounds a little alarmist, senpai."

"No." She pointed at the head agent. "I want your men making rounds around the entire facility. We'll shut down coolant systems and ventilation in certain areas if we have to, but we are-"

"Dr. Akagi?" an older voice asked.

Ritsuko turned to see Vice-Commander Fuyutsuki curiously walking over, a cup of coffee in his hand. Based on the rather confused look on his face, it was apparent he had chanced across the scene, and was now wondering what madness had infected the head of Project E.

"Vice-Commander, we've found a large... rat colony," she said, deciding not to press her luck with ravings about rodent civilizations. "I'm organizing a sweep to ensure they don't disrupt our operations."

"Yes, I understand the concern, but this seems rather... disproportionate," came the diplomatic reply. "Doctor, we are having officials from the JSSDF come over this evening, and they'll be here until morning. Shutting down NERV over rats will not be a good look for this organization."

"The JSSDF is a waste of taxpayer dollars," she said. "Losing face to them is preferable to losing one of the MAGI."

"I think we have different threat appraisals, here," Fuyutsuki replied. "At the very least, the sweep must be discreet and passive until they leave. I'm not authorizing shutting down entire sections of the most important facility on Earth just to catch some rats."

Ritsuko bit her tongue. "Very well."

"I recommend getting some rest before the big day tomorrow," the Vice-Commander said. "In the meantime, I think I'll go shop for some mousetraps for my office."

He walked back down the hallway. Ritsuko turned back to the Section Five agents still at work. In one of the plastic bags appeared to be a rat cart, made from a matchbox, and she stared intently at it.

"Senpai, your eye is twitching," Maya said.

鼠

I don't know how I washed up where I did, or how long I was in the pipes for. All I knew was that I was tired and scared, a soaked rat with nowhere to go. It seemed that all I could do was sit by the water, with only glossy plastic pages of schematics for company, and wait. Waiting for what? I don't know. Maybe to hear my father's voice. Maybe to wait for the humans to grab me with their gloves and do all the horrible things to rats Dad said they do.

I had already read the schematics before, along with all the other things in the office, but I still read them over again. I turned each page mechanically, staring at the detailed drawings of armor plating and restraints and entry plugs. When I got to the last page, I just closed the pad and stared at the back. Darkness surrounded me, and it felt heavier than the world itself, crushing me into a ball and compelling me to sleep.

"What are you doing here?" a soft voice asked.

I woke up at those words, after who knows how long. Heavenly light began to fill the pipe, and I saw Yui Ikari sitting across the trickle of the water opposite me. It was funny, seeing her so small, instead of the titan on the computer screen that I had first seen.

"I'm here because I didn't listen to my dad," I said, quietly. "And now, I've lost my family, and I don't know if I'll ever find them again."

"No, Remy," she said, and it felt so strange and yet so right for her to say my name. "What are you doing here? Why haven't you found a way out?"

"I don't know if I can get out," I replied, then shook my head. "Why am I even talking to you? You're dead."

She smiled with that same wan look she always had in her videos. "And why should that stop me? Does my being dead mean my projects don't endure? Is Yui Ikari still not rebuilding the world?"

I looked at her, feeling the weight lift off me, if only a little.

"Despair is the victory of every obstacle," she said, standing up and walking down the end of the pipe. "The only way to beat it is to try."

Then she was gone, and where she had been was now a faint gash in the pipe, light trickling through. Blinking, I felt like I'd accidentally bitten into a live wire again, and I scurried towards the light. It didn't take a lot of chewing before I could poke my head through. Before my eyes, I saw a cavernous ceiling, criss-crossed with support beams and pipes.

Pulling myself out of the pipe, I nearly slipped, then regained my footing and began scampering along. I didn't know where I was, but I chose a direction to go in anyway, crawling atop the pipe. Looking below, I saw a massive access shaft, the big ones we sometimes found scrap near. It was nerve-wracking to crawl along the edge of it, since I couldn't see the bottom, but I made it across.

There were bright lights up ahead, and I scurried even faster, even though some part of me was saying "don't go there you idiot, lights means humans".

I finally arrived at the edge of some great square cavern, bigger than anywhere I'd been before. I guess there were parts of NERV the humans knew better than us. Though that wasn't exactly the first thing that came to mind. Rather, it was horrible stench of blood that stuck its fingers into my nose and pushed me back, nearly making me empty out my stomach.

Holding my breath, I looked into the cavern, and promptly forgot to hold my breath.

A sea of red took up almost the entire floor of the place, and submerged in it was something I had only scene in drawings before. I couldn't believe it. I rubbed my eyes, but the massive purple titan was still there.

"That's the Evangelion!" I exclaimed, an unbelieving laugh escaping me. "I've been living above the Evangelion project the entire time?"

"It's a beautiful thing, isn't it?" the Yui of my imagination said, peering over alongside me. "The key to restoring the world, my life's work."

She gestured. "Go and take a closer look."

I saw a little support beam running across the ceiling, and hooked my paws around it, carefully walking along its length until I was roughly above the Evangelion. All around me, I could see the support system for the machine.

"What do you see?" Yui asked.

"Well, let's see..." I pointed to the red sea surrounding the Evangelion. "That's an LCL bath, meant to regulate the biological processes of the Eva when not in use."

"Good," she said. "Anything else?"

"There's the entry plug, so the pilot can interface with the core."

"Mmhmm."

"And those cables are for charging the internal batteries, and to polarize the armor plating."

"Yes, good. Now, what of the personnel?"

"I see..." I paused, peering down. "There's the dry engineers, handling the stuff like the armor and support machinery, all very important, and then the divers down there are the wet engineers, all for the biological part of the Eva, also important..."

"What about the boy?"

"The boy?" I looked around, until I saw a small figure standing between two taller ones. "What's a boy doing here?"

鼠

"Father," Shinji said, staring up.

"It's been some time."

鼠

"Perhaps he plays a part in this you don't know yet," Yui said.

"Oh, c'mon," I retorted. "This is the most important project in, well, the history of anything. Only the best of the best can be here. Why would they bring a kid here?"

"Every other role has been accounted for," she said. "All except one. The most important role to play for Eva."

I snorted. "What, like the pilot?"

She simply smiled.

My ears folded back, and I looked back down. Dr. Akagi was there, talking to him, as if instructing him about the thing. There were a lot of personnel milling about, a lot more than was required for routine maintenance according to the notes I'd read.

"Wait," I said, slowly, not wanting the realization to hit me. "He's... that kid's the pilot?! He's the pilot? But he's just a kid! Why would they-"

I couldn't finish that train of thought before the ceiling rumbling above derailed it. My grip on the support beam slipped, and I fell down to the LCL below.

鼠

"You are the only suitable candidate," the scientist was telling him. "You were selected-"

There was a faint splashing sound, ,ore like a "blup" than an actual splash, and the scientist whipped her head back towards the sea of blood before them. Even through the weight of the revelation that had been laid on him, Shinji swore he saw the woman's eye twitch.

She looked back to him, and resumed a bit more restrained. "You were selected by the Marduk Institute. You are the Third Child."

鼠

Not only did the LCL smell like blood, it tasted like it, too. The coppery taste filled my mouth as I sank beneath the scarlet surface, the wind knocked out of me by the fall, and for a moment I felt the panic any sane rat would when it felt like he was about to drown. My vision began to darken as I held my breath and tried to swim.

Then Yui was there, floating beside me. "What are you doing? You know it's oxygenated, Remy."

That I did. And so I forced myself to breathe in the smelly liquid, and instead of overcoming me, the darkness in my vision disappeared. I took a few breaths, floating suspended in the LCL. Looking around, I could see the rest of the Eva cage, tinted orange and obscured in the distance. The Evangelion's legs were like pillars of eternity in the deep.

Surfacing would not be a good idea, not when I could get spotted, and so I began to swim towards the Eva. All of the wet engineers had already pulled out, so at least I didn't have to worry about that.

I did have to worry, however, about what had caused me to fall in the first place. And how did I know about that? When the massive girder suddenly fell into the LCL, the current created by its descent spinning me like a top and flinging me towards the wall. I barely had time to reorient myself before the next piece of debris crashed in, a chunk of concrete. Swimming to it, I used it to push off and finally reach the Eva.

The polarized armor plating squeaked under my paws as I tried to grip it, and eventually I had to look for screws and bumps to pull myself up by as I climbed the arm of the Evangelion. With the buoyancy of the LCL, it was quick going, and pretty quickly I was close to the surface. Crawling to the side, I went around the shoulder, and towards the nape of the neck.

Now, with the Eva blocking me from sight, I could rise above the surface and finally cough up the gross-tasting LCL. Which wasn't as hard as Yui's notes made it out to be. You know, little rat lungs and all. Climbing up onto a piece of shoulder armor, I shook the LCL out of my fur and looked around.

Well, it didn't look like there were a lot of viable exits, but at least the shaking on the ceiling stopped, and no one was around to see me yet. Maybe they'd clear out before launch, and I could get out of here.

Then I saw it. It was sticking out of the Eva's neck, looking exactly like the schematics I had scene before. A towering white cylinder that descended into the exposed vertebrae of the titan, with an open hatch.

The entry plug.

And it was wide open.

I shook my head and turned around. Now was not the time to be fooling around, not when there were a dozen humans that could be finding me at any time, not when the ceiling was shaking and I didn't know why. I was still on the Eva, and I needed to get off.

My eyes opened, and looked down. My hind paws rested on the cool purple armor of the Eva.

I was on the Eva. The thing I had seen in my dreams time and time again, the greatest creation of my idol. Who knew when I could get this change again? Besides, I was just going to look around, and see the inside of the plug. You know, just to check if it matched the schematics.

And so, I scurried over to the open hatch, and hopped into the entry plug. Oh my God, it was just like the schematics. There was the great chair that the pilot would sit in, and the LCL pumps, and the control yokes that the pilot would use to guide the Evangelion.

I couldn't help myself. I climbed onto the chair, and sat down in it, legs splayed out like in the sketches. Not quite like how it was in my dreams, of course. For one thing, it was like ten times too big. You know, being made for a human and all, instead of, well, a rat. I couldn't even reach the yokes. That still didn't stop me from closing my eyes and pretending I could, though.

"A marvel, isn't it?" I opened my eyes to see Yui sitting astride the front of the chair. "Is it what you imagined it would be?"

"Oh, yeah," I replied. "I mean it's a bit too big, but you know..."

Then I saw that right next to her, there was a slightly loose bolt. That nagged at me- this was the most important project in history, and some technician forgot to twist the wrench an extra time?

It bothered me so much, in fact, that I found myself scurrying over, grabbing the inlaid bolt in both hands like a wheel. Grunting, I twisted it a little bit, though it felt like I was trying to roll my brother over in his sleep, and the panel was tightened. Dusting my hands off, I surveyed the plug.

"There we are," I said to Yui. "Now I have to get out of h- wait, is the pump not properly dilated?!"

I know that sounded like a major overreaction, but Yui's notes specifically stated that they had to be 2.1 centimeters across when preparing to launch, and this was a whopping 2.23 according to the little analog dial. That was utterly unacceptable. Where did they think they were working, a... place where it was okay to be that sloppy?

Didn't really have another place to compare it too. I'm a rat.

"So what are you going to do about it?" Yui asked. "Are you going to escape, or are you going to do what you need to do?"

I already had the answer to that. I went over and properly dilated the LCL pump, then crawled beneath the chair to check the suspension, and worked my way down to find any more loose bolts, or improperly calibrated filters. I didn't even notice that it got darker in the plug until I made my way back up to the top to check on the yoke-

-and saw the boy from before staring at me, his eyes wide.

There was just a moment where we stared at each other, not moving a muscle. Then, still looking at him, I fixed the plastic cap back over the trigger on the yoke.

The boy looked like he was about to say something, before the speaker activated.

"Shinji, prepare for launch," some voice said.

The boy -Shinji- nervously looked away from me, and I scampered back a little. The plug began to fill with LCL, as expected, but when I looked at him all I saw was panic.

"What's happening?" he blurted, staring at the crimson tide.

I couldn't believe it. He didn't even know what the LCL was? And where was his plugsuit? Were they really having to ship him out that quick?

The LCL submerged me, and then him quickly enough. Now that I was used to it a bit, I could breathe it in, while he still thrashed in it, as if expecting to drown.

"It's oxygenated, Shinji, you can breathe it!" Dr. Akagi was now saying.

The boy still thrashed, then out of the corner of his eye he saw me clearly not drowned. Pausing to stare, he finally sucked in a lungful. Hey, if a rat could do it, why couldn't he?

"Synchronizing now," Dr. Akagi said.

The interior of the plug shimmered and sparkled, and I felt my little heart hammer against my ribs as I realized it was happening. The boy's mind was linking to the primal consciousness of the Evangelion, just like Yui's notes said. All I could do was watch the wonder in action, as the dark plug gave way to the world outside and the machine began to stir, matching his movements.

I could see the LCL drain, and the Eva be lifted on the great platform beneath its feet. Slowly, we moved into position, and locked into the launch tube. Shinji wasn't even looking at me, just as enraptured by what was going on as I was. He looked around the tube, eyes wide.

"Unit-01, launch!"

Up we went, an intense-enough force that I nearly fell off the chair and had to cling on as we rose above the facility. Then the sheer metal walls gave way to something I had never seen before.

A sky.

Dad had told me about, growing up. He said it was overrated and dangerous. The sky was for hawks, and humans crazily trying to imitate them in metal machines. But when I saw those stars twinkling above, I realized I had gone my entire life with something missing.

There were also stars to the side, and in the ground below. There it was, just like the pictures I'd seen in people's offices. Tokyo-3, the Citadel City, the Last Fortress of Humankind.

Shinji was staring at something ahead, looking rather nervous. When I turned around, I saw why.

I had never seen them in the notes and essays Yui wrote. She said that they had no idea what they were going to look like, but they'd know them as soon as they saw them.

As I gawked at the Angel before me, I knew what she meant by that. And I thought humans were big. This thing was even bigger to them than they were to me- why, the whole colony probably weighed less than the tip of its pinky! It looked almost like a human in a silly costume, but with longer and skinnier arms, and its skull-like head was in its chest. If that was the head, anyway.

At least there was a core, like the notes said. That meant it could be destroyed. Despite the nervousness the thing had instilled in me, I couldn't but actually feel excited. Yui's creation, the Evangelion, was about to make its first sortie, and I had a front row seat.

The Eva stepped forward, and promptly fell over.

The impact knocked me off the chair, and I had to swim back to it and hold on. Looking back at the kid, I saw that his eyes were closed, disoriented by the fall. When he opened them, they were wide, terrified. My worst fears were confirmed. They were really sending out an untrained kid to pilot the creation of Yui Ikari. If I wasn't going to die horribly from an Angel, I would've been laughing at how stupid it sounded.

"C'mon, kid!" I shouted at Shinji, which only made his eyes somehow widen further. "Do something! Get your AT-field up!"

Then a black hand grabbed us- I mean, the Eva- by the head, and we were lifted up high. The kid was beginning to really panic, now. When the grip tightened visibly, he let out a scream.

And that's up to speed, I guess. There I was, uselessly watching the last hope of the world get picked up by the head, its woefully-unprepared pilot screaming. Was this really how it was going to end?

Behind the boy, I saw Yui again, but this time she seemed less like a glowing figment of my imagination, and more like flesh and blood. She looked to me, an intense look on her face.

"You know what to do, Remy," she said.

My paws clenched. She was right. I did know what to do. The boy might not be much of a pilot, but I was. He couldn't fight this thing, but I could. And if there was any time to do it, it had to be now.

Darting over, I grabbed Shinji's hand, and tugged on it. The yoke went back, and I could feel Shinji's muscles twitch as he reacted to my touch, as if he was trying to swat me away. That reaction translated into the Eva's hand doing the swatting, a great backhand that caught the Angel in its core. The grip laxed, and we fell back down, this time on the Eva's knees.

Shinji looked at me, then looked at the Angel. Again it was reaching for us, and again I tugged on his hand. This time, the Eva's hand batted the Angel's away, the force of the blow breaking its arm.

I was doing it. I was actually piloting the Evangelion.

Of course, as the lurch of the machine proved, I had a much worse copilot to deal with. The Evangelion tried to get back up, only to once again stumble. At least this time, it landed on top of the Angel, pinning it to the ground. The core was exposed, glittering and cracked. As Shinji tried to get back up, I saw my opportunity, and again crawled for his hand.

This time, I grabbed his hand, and guided it down. Thankfully, he seemed to have an idea what direction to numbly swat the hand this time, and the armored knuckles whipped onto the core, widening the cracks. Two more times, and the core split.

And with that, I defeated my first Angel. It was far different from what I had imagined in my dreams, but this was different. The reality of it outweighed the flaws, as all I had studied came to fruition. Why, the Angel's body was even bubbling, just like what Yui said would happen during wave-form collap-

The pop of red-orange that splashed against the Evangelion was a lot messier than in my dreams. A lot louder, too. My ears were still ringing when I turned to look at Shinji again, to see if he was now going to try and swat the rat in his seat.

Instead, however, he was just looking at me, big blue eyes blinking in disbelief. They were still looking at me when the plug went dark, and the Eva leaned forward in deactivation.

鼠

Shinji was quick to clamber out of his seat as soon as the LCL began to drain and the hatch slid open. Leaning over the lip of the entrance, he hacked up the orange liquid in a rather undignified manner, spattering onto the deck of the cage. Looking up, he saw Misato and Dr. Akagi standing just outside, along with a handful of technicians.

Climbing out of the plug fully, he hugged himself, uncomfortably aware of how waterlogged his clothes were now. Thankfully, it seemed Misato had thought ahead on that, and had brought a towel. He graciously took it and wrapped it around himself, fighting the urge to shiver.

Of course, all of these feelings were superseded by the numb shock he was still in. He should've died out there. He could barely crawl or take a step; the Angel had him where it wanted him.

But he was still alive, and the Angel was dead.

Because a rat helped him pilot.

He was still doubting his sanity when Misato spoke, and intruded into his little world. "You did a good job out there, Shinji. Are you alright?"

He nodded, eyes furtively looking around the chamber they had brought the Evangelion back to.

"You had us worried for a while. We didn't have time to properly set up the holocamera system in the plug, so we couldn't tell how you were taking to piloting."

"Sorry," he mumbled.

Misato stifled a laugh. "What's to be sorry for, Shinji. You won. Better than the MAGI were expecting, too."

"Yeah," he said, uneasily. "I did."

Now it was Dr. Akagi's turn to speak. "You'll also have to undergo a post-mission physical. Lieutenant Ibuki here will escort you to the locker room first, though; you must be feeling like a drowned-"

Then her tired eyes popped open, and Shinji jolted as she jabbed a finger just slightly to his left. "RAT!"

Spinning to follow her gesture, Shinji saw that the rat -the one who had saved his life- had been trying to discretely exit the plug, still drenched in LCL. Its eyes met with his, unusually large and expressive, its terror palpable.

Several things happened in short order. Dr. Akagi shrieked, and the rat bolted away from the plug, towards the back of the Evangelion. Its path was cut off by a suddenly-thrown clipboard, however, and it darted in the opposite direction, only for someone else to toss a hardhat at it and barely miss. In his peripheral vision, he saw a young woman technician spark up a blowtorch and prepare to bear down on the rat.

It was then that he found himself reaching forward and catching the small rodent in his hands, almost hunched over to protect it from whatever new projectiles was sent its way. It briefly tried to struggle in his grip, only to seem to give up as he clutched it close to his chest and turned around.

The gathered personnel were all looking at him, with various expressions. Dr. Akagi seemed ready to either faint or grab for Misato's gun, while Misato herself seemed more confused and concerned. The technician with the blowtorch, whom he had previously thought to be rather meek and inoffensive, now had a steely glare directed at the rat.

There was a moment of silence, then Misato bent forward to look at the technician.

"Maya, where did you get the blowtorch?"

Maya blinked, then looked down and turned it off. "I don't know."

"Shinji, that rat's a biohazard," Dr. Akagi ordered, voice shaky. "You need to give it to me for disposal."

"But..." he fumbled for an answer other than 'it saved my life and can pilot the Eva'. "...he's... my... pet rat."

Misato tilted her head to the side. "Wait, I don't remember seeing him."

"He... was in my backpack," he mumbled, then a little more resolutely, "I sometimes put him my pocket when I'm nervous. I-I guess I forgot to take him out when I went in the Eva."

Thank goodness his nervous look could be associated to him just coming out of a fight with a giant monster he still didn't understand. Misato seemed to buy it, if her relaxing posture meant anything. Dr. Akagi seemed ready to reluctantly follow suit, until her eyes widened again, as if in horrified recognition.

"Wait, that's the rat from before!" she said, pointing again. Her eye was twitching again.

"What?" Shinji and Misato asked again.

"Senpai," Maya began, gently.

"-don't 'senpai' me, that's the rat that was in my office! The one from the colony with the... with the city..." She seemed to lose her bluster as everyone began to give her a concerned look, particularly Misato. She cleared her throat. "It's a wild rat. We need to terminate it."

"Rits, let the kid keep his rat," Misato said, holding up her hands like she was trying to soothe a spooked horse. "He just saved the planet, okay?"

"Misato, there's no telling what contact with the Eva might have done to it. It might cause-"

"What's going on here?" a gruff voice said.

The group parted like the Red Sea, and Shinji saw Dad stepping through, standing well above the others. His eyes studied him, and Shinji felt as though someone had put an ice cube on his nape.

"Commander, the Third Child is simply reluctant to let us dispose of a wild-" Dr. Akagi began, only to quiet when Dad raised his hand palm-first in her general direction.

"I was asking the pilot." He stepped closer, looming over Shinji. "What is going on here?"

Shinji shrank under the shadow, and cautiously looked into his eyes. "I, uh, brought my pet rat with me, but Dr. Akagi thinks he's a stray and wants to put him down, and..."

He fell quiet as his father continued to stare into his eyes. Then he looked down at the rat, and Shinji saw an expression he never remembered seeing on his father- a scrunched brow. The look he then gave Shinji seemed to say "You're lying."

However, he simply leaned back and spoke aloud. "This is clearly a pet, Dr. Akagi. The pilot will, however, understand that if it is brought into NERV again, it must be put down to avoid a potential biohazard."

Then he quietly walked away, and Shinji looked back to the others. Dr. Akagi looked like she was on the verge of a stroke, while Misato gave him a sympathetic glance. He looked down to rat, who was staring back with wide eyes.

He sighed. Why did it feel like fighting the Angel was not going to be the craziest part of his day?

鼠

Misato was kind enough to give him a cardboard box with holes in it -"A backpack is a terrible place to carry a pet, Shinji," she had admonished- to put the rat in as they drove to her apartment. It was night out in Tokyo-3, now, and he watched the glittering skyline through the car window as they sped down empty streets.

They walked up to the apartment in silence- even the rat was staying quiet in the box- and Misato opened the door.

"Welcome to my humble abode," she said, gesturing inside. "This will be your home until we figure out where you're staying."

After a moment, he stepped inside, looking around at the apartment. Or, rather, the piles of empty boxes and wrappers obscuring the apartment from sight. He numbly walked into the kitchen, looking around.

"I have to go back and complete a mountain of paperwork, but I'll be back in time for some late night snacks." Misato smiled. "Make yourself at home. Bye!"

Then she was gone, and he was alone in the apartment.

No, not alone.

Opening the box, he scooped the rat out and put it on the countertop. For its part, it stood on its hind legs, looking at him expectantly. Shinji sucked in a deep breath.

Then he grabbed at his hair and screamed.

"What just happened! I woke up this morning expecting just to see where my dad works! But no, instead I nearly get stomped on by a giant monster, and then I nearly get nuked, then I'm told I have to pilot a giant robot... thing and fight the giant monster, and..."

He shook his head and began to pace back and forth, kicking empty beer cans out of the way.

"This is insane! I should be dead! I can't pilot that thing. What were they thinking? It had me right where it wanted. But then-"

He looked at the rat, who seemed to be following the rant along, albeit with a concerned expression.

"You did something! You somehow caused me to kill the Angel, and now I'm bringing you here because I don't know if I'm losing my mind about seeing you help me pilot the Eva, and now I'm talking to a rat and... did you know what you were doing?"

The rat nodded. Shinji pulled at his hair again, eyes closed. "I don't even know why I'm here. I... I'm not a hero. But my father actually wanted me for something for once, and-"

He stopped.

Eyes now wide open, he looked back to the rat.

"Did... did you just nod?"

The rat nodded.

"You can understand me?"

Another nod.

"Not a trick?"

It shook its head this time, and Shinji actually relaxed a little. He wasn't going crazy- it was just everything and everyone else that was going crazy. He let out a nervous laugh, and ran his hands through his hair.

"What were you even doing in there? Just an accident?"

The rat gave a kind of so-so expression.

"What do you mean, kind of? You don't kind of accidentally get in there. I mean, I guess I did, but..." He shook his head. "You just told me you knew what you were doing. How?"

The rat scratched its chin, as if in deep thought, then padded over to a ledger Misato had left on the counter. Flipping the cover, it tapped the paper.

"So you read about it..." Shinji murmured, only to get struck by another realization. "Wait, you can read? Can you write, too?"

The rat nodded, a little slower this time. Shinji looked about the kitchen, saw a paper bag, and grabbed it. Pulling the pen out from the ledger's slot, he handed it to the rat, who took it in both paws.

"Um, I guess we should introduce each other first." He tapped his chest. "I'm Shinji. What's your name?"

The rat slowly began to write in scratchy Latin characters. Shinji watched, enraptured, as a name formed.

"Re, rei, reh," he said, slowly, trying to remember his scant English lessons. "Remy. That's your name?"

Another nod.

"That's not a Japanese name."

Remy looked at him like he was an idiot for asking that. Shinji decided to move on.

"Where did you learn to pilot the Eva?"

akagi office, wrote Remy.

"Wait, so she was actually right?" Shinji grimaced. "I don't think she'd be happy about that."

Remy shrugged.

"So that's why you were in the Eva. You... you actually want to pilot that thing?"

Remy gave him a resolute look, chest puffed out, and nodded curtly.

"But you can't, because Dr. Akagi wants to put her down."

A grimace and a nod.

"But if... if I can somehow sneak you into the plug, then you can pilot like you did before." He slowly began to smile. "And, I can stay here, where Dad wants me."

Remy seemed less focused on that, and more on looking longingly at the fridge. Shinji followed his gaze, and understood.

"I'll get you something." He got up and moved to the fridge. Opening it up, he saw there was little but junk food and beer, but he managed to find a single kiwi Misato must have forgotten.

"Let's seal the deal with this," he suggested, cutting the kiwi in half and turning around. "Then-"

Remy was gone. Shinji looked around furtively, starting to feel nervous.

"No, no," he muttered, walking over. "No..."

There was no way he could find him in this mess. And that was assuming he hadn't already squeezed through the door and ran back out. Shinji slumped to the floor, and hugged his knees.

"It's over," he mumbled, trying to curl into a ball so hard he'd scrunch out of existence. "For once, Dad actually wanted me for something, and now I can't even do that. Even a rat thinks I'm a burden."

Then, suddenly, he heard crinkling wrappers, and looked up to see Remy slowly padding back towards him. The rat seemed to be studying him, an understanding look on his face.

Shinji wiped at his eyes with his arm, then sat up. "Are we going to actually do it? Partners?"

Remy nodded, and held out a paw in a handshake. Shinji almost laughed at the absurdity of it, then extended a fingertip. They shook 'hands'.

"Partners," he said. Then, he handed over the kiwi.

Remy ravenously tore into it, and Shinji squeezed his own half of the fruit and began eating it. They sat like that for a while, munching on slightly overripe fruit, watching each other.

And with that, a beautiful partnership was born.

鼠

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Anyone Can Be a Pilot, Chapter Un