I do not own the rights to Neon Genesis Evangelion, or any of the characters, equipment, or locations written in this fanfiction. The purpose of this fanfiction is merely for the non-profit enjoyment of other readers. If requested by Gainax, Hideki Anno, or other parties which represent aforementioned objects in this story, I will remove it promptly.

Chapter XXXI:

There is something haunting about flight without wings or other equipment. You're just floating there, with no attitude control, no nothing, hoping you don't end up smacking into a wall or taking your head off on a support beam. The flight itself lasted only twenty, maybe thirty seconds, but I was terrified that entire time. This was one of those times when I had absolutely no control, and the fact I let it happen disgusted me.

Fuyutsuki was about to protest when I hovered above the body of Gendo Ikari, but that did not last too long. Energy weapons, at least the real ones, don't emit electromagnetic frequencies on the visible spectrum. Scenes with brilliant glowing orbs that you see in Dragonball Z or Naruto are entirely false. I knew, because that's what came out of my hand. I couldn't see it, but the repulsion I felt after whatever it was discharged, and the smell of my right palm slightly baking from the intense heat convinced me it was real. I seemed the only one in my head who registered the pain, or bothered to pay attention to it. The Angels were too preoccupied as their invisible energy weapon shoved Fuyutsuki back against the concrete wall of the highest point of the bridge.

There was a series of snapping cracks, like celery stalks being broken, and the body let out a heavy wheeze. The others on the bridge were running now, trying their best to evacuate. A few like Ibuki stayed behind, but mainly to weep over Hyuga, struggling to stay alive as he slowly bled to death. My voice shouted back down to her, but not with my words. No, the Angels, as much as they tried to learn how to function as an individual Lillim, only copied my actions as a template. They couldn't even get my favorite phrases right.

"Female!" they shouted in unison, but the sound only came out as my one, single voice. "Prepare Evangelion Unit-04."

Maya just stared back up at me. "If I... refuse?"

That's when I felt my right hand move, and noticed something from the floor of the command deck slowly float up to meet me. My stomach started to churn as I recognized the decapitated head of Commander Fuyutsuki. His hair was coated in his own blood, making it difficult to maintain a grip on his strands of hair. Ibuki cringed, then pulled Hyuga closer to her, trying to keep him awake.

"...Okay," she breathed.

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"Damn you!" Shinji screamed over the tac-net. They were the few words he had learned from Asuka to express in English. I suppose he meant to say something far worse, far more foul towards me. Then again, there is only so much time for one to ask Asuka Soryu for a couple quick vulgar words in English to shout at an enemy, especially if you need to scramble as soon as possible. It was only a half an hour from the moment I, or rather, the Angels through my body, began their assault. I was quite impressed with the response time of the Children. Obviously their training was far superior in real life than compared to the animated series. Then again, all they had to do was climb into the Eva, and follow routine procedures. They didn't have to outwit their former comrades, possibly kill them, and then run off undetected to fight a threat with limited intelligence on the enemy's logistics. Clearly they had the advantage.

"I knew it!" Asuka shouted, taking the effort to speak in English. "You traitor!" Both Unit-02 and Unit-01 were already sprinting for me, while Rei remained behind. At least, that's what it appeared at first, but given her talents, I found it hard to believe she wouldn't come after me at some point or another. "You worthless traitor!" the redhead kept screaming.

The entry plug hummed softly, the navigational display drafting a thin green line towards the first waypoint, the topographic features displayed as a collection of vector graphics. I toggled the switches to my right on the center console, checking my cache of weapons. As I did so, I spoke aloud to make notes into the data recorder. "Unit-04 confirming inventory: two palette rifles, each with 300 HEAT rounds, and 200 sabot rounds. One positron rifle, S2 powered, two progressive knives, and a battleaxe, which should give me just enough hardware if the mass-production units arrive ahead of schedule."

I switched on the auxiliary monitor to my left, which appeared as an overlaid display on the entry plug wall. Typing in a few commands, I needed to know the abilities of my former allies. Unfortunately Maya had already locked out my security clearance to access the Magi from the Eva, so instead of actual data taken from the armory inventories, I had to try and piece together their equipment based solely on observation.

Unit-01 carried a positron rifle, while Unit-02 had a lance in it's hands, and a palette rifle slung over it's right shoulder. The umbilical cables had been spooling out from the far edge of the city limits for thirty seconds now. While Unit-02 would have a battery reserve of five minutes, given the large protrusions strapped to it's shoulder pylons, I had the lead by a good five or six kilometers. Sooner or later, Asuka and Rei would have to go back for some kind of transport craft to catch up. At that point, it would just be up to Shinji.

"Why do you always have to play the hero?" I muttered to myself, forgetting the entry plug's communication system was set on VOX. I caught it just a few seconds later, but decided to leave it on. If I was going to die, there would be a record of my final battle. Maybe sometime in the future, politicians and military analysts would listen to it with a sense of dread. It would be as haunting as the last recording of that geologist, Johnston, who died when Mt. St. Helens erupted back in 1980. My hairs always stood on end whenever I heard "Vancouver, Vancouver, this is it!" Maybe that would be the same reaction people later on would have if these recordings were ever released to the public.

I heard Asuka begin to curse, then noticed the second of the two radar blips go still for a few seconds, and then continue onward. "You had to jettison the umbilical, didn't you Asuka?" I asked teasingly. It was like that line in the movie Death Trap, at the climax with Michael Caine and Christopher Reeve trying to kill each other. "You know you won't be able to cover Shinji forever, don't you?"

Asuka had long since cut the video feed from her entry plug, but she was under orders to stay in touch with me. Being the only one fluent in English that was left to negotiate, she had to tolerate my every word. "Oh, trust me," she began. "You'll wish I was covering Shinji when he gets to you. He's not just going to stop you, you know?"

"Well, I could try to explain to you that I didn't kill Misato, and that I was also going after the people who really did it, but then there's that whole killing Rokubungi thing, isn't there?" Asuka just stared. "Oh, I'm sorry, you'd know him better as Commander Ikari. But then again, there is no justification that I can offer for what I've done, is there?"

"Ends don't justify the means, right?" the German asked.

"Precisely," I answered. "You know, it's really a shame we can't have more of these conversations without having to try and kill each other, or with one of us being hospitalized. I must say, I enjoy your company." This seemed to irritate the Second Child even more, the radar blip tagged "02" on my lower central monitor picking up speed. "Don't waste your battery charge, Asuka. If you want a shot at me, you have to conserve it as long as possible."

"DON'T YOU DARE DISCUSS TACTICS WITH ME!" The pleasant but disturbing beeping of the incoming missile alarm began to wail. Checking the radar monitor again, I noticed a small series of projectiles branch off from "02", coming towards me at supersonic velocity. They impacted the AT-Field harmlessly, the reverberations of crunching, deforming metal and exploding fuel shaking the small atmosphere trapped within Unit-04's protective barrier. The entry plug, as well as the construct, was jostled momentarily, but continued on course.

"You're too far out of range for that weapon to do any good. Conserve your ammo until you can get closer. Your best bet would be an ambush, with Shinji driving me towards your trap."

"What did I JUST tell you?" Soryu grumbled.

"Alright," I sighed. "Then, you pick the subject."

"What?"

"Hey, I have a long way to walk in this thing. You're the negotiator. Who else am I supposed to talk to until you either kill me, or I escape?"

"You think this is some kind of game?"

I grumbled slightly, noticing the change in terrain. We had come to the end of the smooth valley floor of the Tokyo-3 city limits, and here, the mountains began. The maneuvers would become slower, and there would be times ahead when I knew I would have to leave some gear behind to make it through the mountain range ahead. "Hardly," I sighed. "But if I don't talk to someone other than these Angels floating around in my head, I'm going to go crazy."

It was about two minutes before Soryu spoke again. "Shinji... he really wants to kill you." The girl's voice was softer, almost sad. "You... you betrayed us, all of us."

"Yeah," I grunted, forcing the yokes forward as Unit-04 began the slow climb up the side of the first mountain range. The incline wasn't particularly steep compared to some of the more impressive formations ahead, but it still made me a bit nervous. Even with all the sensory input coming in just fine, piloting an Eva up the side of a mountain felt more like rock climbing in a jeep than in person.

The weapons I had carried so far were now a burden, and I had to go light. While the S2 powered positron cannon would have been the best bet to take with me, I couldn't afford the weight. I plugged in the umbilical adapter, and with a few keystrokes, spun the S2 drive up to 90 percent output. Locking on with the pulse-doppler radar, Unit-01 was in perfect position. "Crap," I hissed, firing a few short bursts downrange.

There was a burst of static over the tac-net, followed by a scream. Switching to infrared at maximum magnification, I could see bits of molten armor and vaporized flesh peeling away from the upper torso of Unit-01. There was no chance for Shinji to run. "Get down!" Asuka screamed, Unit-02 running up by Ikari's side, forcing him to take cover. The purple construct fell to it's knees, the synthetic blood prevented from leaking out by the cauterized wound. The creature's right arm was gone, and with it, the molten remains of the positron cannon burned in the small impact crater left behind at Unit-02's feet.

"You BITCH!" Asuka shrieked. Shinji just kept moaning and crying over the entry plug's speakers. He was slowly going into shock, but not fast enough. "You... bitch..." Soryu repeated again.

"What the hell are you waiting for?" I screamed. "Cut his goddamn neural connections!" It was a few seconds later when I brought the infrared video signal to the main entry plug display that I saw the white hot cylinder unscrew from the back of Unit-01, the L.C.L. projected out in four thin streams by the bilge pumps. "Asuka, talk to me. How is he?"

"You bitch!" she just repeated over and over. Then I heard the exchanges between her and Ikari. Clearly she forgot to switch to the push-to-talk option. Though, in her position, anyone would be preoccupied. "Oh sweet merciful Christ!" she first spoke in English, then started in Japanese. Only a few words came through, but from what I learned, I had done significant damage. The words "synch ratio", and "120 percent" were all I could make out. However, I knew what that meant. Anything beyond a 100 percent synchornization meant the pain wasn't just simulated, but was manifested in the pilot.

"You took his arm off!" Soryu screamed. "You bitch! You took Shinji's own arm off!"

It was then the radar kicked in again, the automated target acquisition feature carrying out it's task remorselessly. A small white outline of a box was centered on Unit-02, know crouched by the fallen Unit-01. She had discarded her weapons, pulling the entry plug free of the crippled beast. For a moment, just a moment, just a moment, I hesitated. Then I came back to my senses. This wasn't time for Nathaniel Hawthorne, I reminded myself. This was time for Clausewitz.

I squeezed the trigger on the right control yoke. Unit-02's chest was melted clear through, Asuka's screech cut short at "You bit-" when the squelch feature cut out the remaining static. It saddened me, thinking that the humanity, the very thing I had hoped these Children would hold on to, would be their downfall. But that was what kept them from turning into Gendo. They were mankind's salvation for that very reason.

Smashing the weapon into a tangled mess of wire and alloy tubing, I abandoned the useless positron rifle. I would not give the enemy a chance to use my own gear against me, and there was no way to take it with me during the ascent. I just wished when I encountered Rei and the mass production Evas, the remaining palette rifle with only the 150 HEAT rounds I retained would be enough. As I began the climb, I looked back at the molten wreckage. "I told you!" I shouted back. "I told you to back off!"

End of Chapter XXXI

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I'm looking for suggestions for a good tagline for this story. Up to this point, I've tried to keep things fresh every few chapters, by changing the story summary. However, as we're nearing the end, I want to find a short, catch phrase or sentence, like the kind used to promote movies, to go with this story. Unfortunately, "No Law", "No Rules," and "No Order" have already been taken by Miami Vice(2006). Any ideas?

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