+++++ Forest outside Kanagawa, Japan. (Sunday + 8)

The exit leading out to the mundane world from Elysium was at the end of an L-shaped curve in the tunnel owing to the fact that observing the outside world from within the time dilation of the city had frequently been found to cause serious health issues. The point where one experienced rate of time's progression from past to future changed to another experienced rate of the same was situated in such a way to avoid direct observation after the trend had been discovered. As a means of protecting the people who had to leave Elysium or enter Elysium, it worked wonderfully to stop that strange form of motion sickness. As a means of preparing people being chased by an ever-expanding mob of abominations for entry into a tense situation between multiple parties, it was less successful.

Hera had moved to act as a rearguard when the pathway out had become blindingly easy to follow. That meant that Mizore was the first one to exit the winding tunnel, carrying both Panacea and Shinji on a less than nimble platform of mobile snow, and when she saw General Soryu directing those forces that had fled ahead of them in a desperate defense of the same exit she was just now fleeing through against more of the same abominations they were running from she made the least terrible choice available, simply dismissing the snow and leaving everyone onboard to tumble to a halt. Turning her attention to several gaps in the attempted holding action and setting out barricades of ice and compacted snow for the humans to take up positions behind, she mentioned the rapidly approaching issue of who they had been running from, "We're going to have contact from behind in a few seconds. We're going to need to get on your helicopters and leave, or get overrun and eaten. I'm not being picky, just giving you options."

Kyoko was a beacon of calm in a hurricane. Unflappable, unbreakable. "Indeed. We were waiting for you and Pilot Ikari. I felt that forcing you to fight through these monsters to get to the helicopter might have been in poor taste. They'll land once you clear them an LZ, and we'll make these things someone else's problem for a time while we regroup."

Hera came slowly backing out of the tunnel, holding her scepter out before her like a talisman and glowing with power. "Frostmother, is everyone clear of the tunnel?"

Mizore focused on pushing corrupted trees, corrupted daemons, and corrupted forest animals back and away with the support of Tsuruko to clear an area for their ride to land. "That I can see. Why aren't we swimming in these things?"

"Because I am making a tomb worthy of my child and his few worthy siblings, while also making it more difficult for these horrors to use any of the other exits nearby." Motioning towards the ground with her weapon, she set the tunnel to collapsing with a cacophonous roar of breaking stone. After the noise died off, she sniffed at her work as adequate and announced, "That may not stop them…but it certainly will slow them down."

Everyone's attention was drawn over to a scream of pure terror from a young woman, and to the instant transformation of Shinji from a confused and lost young man to a dealer of death as he engaged with the enemy causing that scream. Shinobu Maehara had been chosen by one of the maddened treants as an easier target of choice, having snuck a branch along the ground unnoticed by those attempting to defend the 'civilians' to snatch her away from that defense. Shinji had been so unsteady on his feet that even standing still had proven impossible, staggering back and forth as if he were drunk. When he reacted to the young beauty's cry for help Unit-01 remained inside of him, and instead he moved with the rapid ease of a youkai to intervene. The difference, according to those who witnessed the change, was that now he had a task to focus on explicitly.

Two steps carried him thirty meters, a knife of sharpened obsidian formed by thought alone slicing the treant's tendril clean through. He caught Shinobu carefully as she fell back to the earth, cradling her to his form in one arm as he danced backwards, avoiding several lumbering retributive strikes from the tree by summoning fortifications of ice to block them. Once he reached Noriyasu Seta, he forcefully handed over the young woman to the man he believed would be better suited to keeping an eye on her, then resumed his drunken fugue and only wobbled in place with his eyes glazed over.

Sarah McDougal, ignoring her adoptive father, walked over and grabbed Shinji by the waistband of the intricately weaved undergarment he was wearing. Everyone had taken note of the fact that he was mostly nude, though nobody wished to make a large deal out of it owing to the pandemonium playing out around them. The youngest lady present, however, had taken note and was not well pleased to see someone she knew to be injured left to suffer cold and alone. Dragging him back deeper into the fortifications, alongside her adoptive father who was conveying Shinobu, she began speaking in hushed tones that she had seen the man use to comfort someone who'd received a serious head wound, "Thank you for saving her, Sensei. Let's come over here and sit down while General-san quiets everyone down." After reaching the central hub of the defense, where Suzuhara's lover had finally erected a barrier of hollow wood that wasn't good for much but keeping those within it from having to watch extreme acts of violence, she looked at the woman and gestured to Shinji while pushing him to sit down next to Shinobu after her father hurried back out to continue defending everyone. "Can you make him something? A shirt of leaves, or bark, or something? He's going to freeze out here."

"Of course," the woman, later to be identified as a dryad, was eager to do something positive to not only calm the children present but to show her good will towards the man who had announced her great fortune, "cotton is not so hard to craft. I'll make him a basic long robe, if you'll help me put it on him." The cries of war, of the injured, of the attacking monstrosities, were making her nervous, and so she jumped in fright when Naru Narusegawa yanked Sarah away from Shinji.

"Get away from him, Sarah-chan." The long-haired student had a vaguely disgusted frown adorning her face. "We don't know if he's still-"

Sarah, however, was quite done listening to her elders from the Hinata Inn. She had heard from Tsuruko Aoyama what Shinji had said, and how he hurt deeply to hear that a good man had been abused. She had spent every moment from that point reassessing her own actions around the deceased Keitaro Urashima, and had come to the realization that inaction might have been excusable when she hadn't had the knowledge to know appropriate adult behavior from inappropriate, but it was inexcusable now that she had the requisite experience to draw upon. The crack of her palm against Naru's cheek was as loud and violent as any of the sounds of gunfire outside the shelter. "Back off, Narusegawa!" Tearing her arm free, she glared at the woman and stamped over to guard Shinji. "If he was still dangerous, they wouldn't have trusted him out of bed, and certainly not with so much skin exposed. They don't let sick people die because the sick person happens to be a male. They don't treat him like garbage for the crime of finding someone pretty. You can stuff it! He jumped into danger even though he has a concussion to save Shinobu-chan, you stood there like a lump. Come any closer to him, and I'll show you just exactly how much I've grown since our last fight." Without taking her eyes off the woman she felt to be the true danger, she changed her tone of voice, "Daphne-san, please help me help him. I don't want him getting frostbite."

The green-hued Elysian nodded quickly, moving to support a young woman she hoped would be amenable to acting as something of a surrogate older sister to her future daughter. There were worse protectors of the young to be had, of that she was certain. "Of course, dear. It simply wouldn't do to have him waste all of Panacea's efforts by catching a cold, would it?"

Sliding under one of the overhangs into the small wooden structure, Suzuhara read the temperature of the room and exercised the authority granted to him by being stronger than almost anyone else in the shelter. His aura of thinly restrained violence quieted everyone that needed quieting so he could speak. "What's going on?"

"Just setting some ground rules, Uncle." Sarah gave him a self-assured smirk. "There was one of those miscommunications you talked about yesterday, and I made sure everyone knew the truth of things before it got out of hand."

He snorted a laugh, then patted her on the head in approval. "Good job. Gotta keep everything calm in a fight. Panic only helps the enemy." Crouching down near to Shinji as his lover and Sarah worked on dressing him slowly in a layer of cloth, he gave a report to a man he wasn't sure would hear him. "Found the triplets. They're only willing to speak to you, so we need to choose a meeting spot that-"

Ritsuko-san's apartment. Shinji's eyes were as unsteady as his head, twitching instead of flowing smoothly over to consider the man. I can talk there…I think. Maybe. Need to talk.

"…That might be asking them to enter the proverbial lion's den, my friend."

Need to speak. With my mouth. Everyone could have problems with everyone else later, he had to tell them things using his own voice. Get…get them safe. Anyone threatens…I'll kill them. He was done playing nice with people he should be able to trust. The number of people in the room was wrong.

"They're under your protection, then?" He could use that. All he needed was verification from Shinji.

Yes. It was a silly question in his mind. He liked them. They were…irritating, but they were good at heart. He had to protect people with good hearts. Like the two young women next to him. Like the woman trying to dress him. He had to. Anyone hurts someone under my protection, I kill. Another head count of the room, and he frowned. Where's Panacea-san and Naoko-san?

+++++ Maria's Market. (Sunday + 8)

Minutes before Shinji's exit from Elysium, the Sailors were forced to react to the sudden collapse of Michiru after she gazed upon a truth her mind was wholly unprepared to behold. Minako, thinking quickly, flipped the stricken Sailor's mirror over so that nobody else could see into it. She had been able to put together enough of what had preceded Michiru losing consciousness to know that nobody else should risk it, and said as much to the very alarmed Haruka as the woman ran back over to see to her lady love, "She looked at this, then dropped. No cry, no sound, nothing."

"Damn it!" The Sailor for Uranus growled with frustration, feeling for a pulse and trying to think of what could be done. "Ok…ok, we need to get this bitch out and get back to Shinji. He's alone against whatever's causing these quakes." Looking back at the shadowy dome covering over the storefront they were trying to enter, she scowled at it as well. "You…you focus on that. I'll try to get her up. Maybe she can remember what she saw without it causing this again."

"I'm open to suggestions on how to get through this." After a final, worried, glance at the Sailor for Neptune, she turned around and kicked her toes against the dome several times to feel it out. "I'm starting to think I should just punch it."

"I've heard worse ideas from you," Rei called from her perch. The Sailor for Mars had kept up her observation of the area, maintaining her duty as a sentry while the crisis below was handled by those women who she felt capable of handling the tasks themselves. "Uranus isn't wrong, we're wasting time on a problem that shouldn't be one. The fact that those youma haven't returned is even more worrying. They come back in force, we're going to have a hard time defending Neptune."

Minako was surprised to hear Rei support simple brute force. The shrine maiden typically preferred more elegant solutions to problems. "…Ok. Well…." She took a deep breath, placed her knuckles against the dome's surface, exhaled and pulled them back to measure the distance that best allowed her to apply all of her force, then inhaled slowly once more before roaring and putting every ounce of will she could muster into the blow. Her fist impacted, surrounded by the luminous brilliance that was her power, and devastated the boundary.

Fragments collapsed towards the door of the market shop, the energy dissipating and becoming intangible as the hole she had opened ruined the overall structural integrity of the shield. The real oddity for the three conscious Sailors was that there was no noise created beyond that of Minako's call for strength. The shell looked like a glass bowl imploding, yet made less noise than the silence of the grave. It made the sound of the door creaking open all the more ominous.

"Maria-san?" Minako moved closer to the entrance, trying to peer into the darkened store without actually entering. "Maria-san, are you in there? The Denmother sent us to-hrrk!"

Maria, her hair disheveled and her eyes wide with fury, had rushed out of the store and grabbed the Sailor for Venus by the throat. Lifting the blonde up off the ground, she ground out coldly, "You. All of you. It is all your fault!" Easily catching a flaming arrow Rei shot at her, she crushed the magical energy used to create it. "Not once did any of you stop and think through the results of what you're doing!"

Minako felt her throat crumpling, and the instinct to fight warred with the warning she had received about Maria's importance to the defense of the Shrine. She had to try to find a diplomatic solution, but couldn't engage that diplomacy when she couldn't speak or breathe. Her vision began to tunnel, and her mind chose to travel down a different path, thinking of a young man fighting against Angels on a volcano struggling against odds worse than her own. I wish Shinji were here.

A crack of thunder trailed just after a flash of lightning, coalescing into a mostly naked Shinji Ikari wearing only a pair of oddly formed boxers and the beginnings of a cotton shawl about his shoulders. All four women able to see him noted that he was confused and unsteady on his feet. Three of the women noted that his emotions were in disarray, well out of his control. Two of the women noted more scarring present on a body that had clearly seen far too much of it already. One of the women realized that she had made herself the target of a power far beyond anything she could hope to defeat.

Days had passed since he last had seen the Sailors, from his perspective. Far less time from their own. He had seen Venus fight with valor to beat back a threat against his life. They had either seen or heard of his armor failing him. Each of them was aware of the tragedies that had passed, of the friends and family lost. He struggled to remember the last time he had seen Maria, to remember the last time she had done anything that hadn't caused him to be angry. He had to protect Minako, just as she had protected him.

The Sailors for Mars and Uranus, if they had the time and forethought to react, might have called for Shinji to stand down. The situation had to be some sort of misunderstanding, and Maria's anger either explicable or possibly assuaged with appropriate apologies. Venus would have told him that the Denmother said the woman was the key to saving lives. Maria herself would have explained what she had learned about the Space-Time Door. Any or all of these things might have changed what happened next.

Between units of time too small to express in even mathematical form, Shinji went from observing as Maria choked the blonde Warrior of Love to removing the former's heart from her body with a single punch. There was a threat to a woman who had defended him. A woman that showed no signs of being corrupted. Threats to those things that threatened people under his protection died. That's all there was for it, anymore. Spiraling outwards from his elbow, currently residing in the space previously occupied by Maria's heart, a host of laurel branches tore the woman apart before she could even gasp out in disbelief. With the threat ostensibly removed, his body returned to the odd twitching motions from before his arrival. …Shrine. Need to get to Shrine.

+++++ Forest outside Kanagawa, Japan. (Sunday + 8)

"He's that way," Hera and Mizore announced simultaneously, pointing unerringly in the direction of the now missing Eva Pilot.

Kyoko didn't bother asking questions that wouldn't help the present situation, taking charge and getting people to move in the directions she needed them to move. "Ok, we have our heading. Corpsman Temple, get the kids on my bird. Let's get in the air before these things rally and overwhelm the AO."

Noriyasu Seta helped the kindly Petty Officer in silencing protests and questions, moving everyone towards the helicopter as requested, looking at Tsuruko who was doing the same from the other flank. "Sarah says he just disappeared. Haven't quite seen that before."

"Nor would you have." Mizore noted the other two helicopters already taking off and decided to collapse the barrier she'd managed to erect back onto their position to fortify it with the added mass. "I'd heard from Suzuhara-san that the witches have some means of summoning him, though it's only happened once before when they were getting their asses kicked by a particularly difficult youma."

Hera counted heads three times, making certain that everyone leaving was on board, then frowning and counting a fourth. "Where is Panacea?"

Kyoko looked around as well, motioning to the co-pilot. "Ask One-Two and One-Three if they have a diplo on board." As her order was being followed, she turned to Mizore. "How long can you hold that?"

"Not much longer." Mizore was the only person other than Hera still outside of the helicopter. "I hate to say it, but if she's not on one of those other helicopters she's out there and either dead or hiding. We need to leave."

"ΓαμώI" The mother of the Greek gods swore several other choice oaths before motioning for Mizore to climb on. "This was my fault. I should have kept a better eye on the girl, instead of looking for where the Slayer had gone." The helicopter began to rapidly ascend after they both were aboard, the co-pilot making a slashing motion across his throat where it was easily visible to relay the information to the General. After donning a pair of headphones offered to her, she received confirmation of what was meant by the man and sighed, "Γαμώτο."

With the hatches closed and the aircraft in motion, a number of the civilians began to show signs of coming down from the adrenaline surge of combat. The awkward moment of time stretched out where their minds had to decide whether to enter a period of unfocused contemplation or start crying to shed the excess of emotional turmoil. Temple had made certain that the headsets given to them were securely in place but not attached to microphones that would only end up causing problem for everyone on board, then set to inspect wounds and making health and safety assessments. The air around them all had a heaviness to it, the sense that momentous things had happened and were continuing to happen.

"CONTACT, THREE THIRTY!" The pilot yanked the helicopter into an evasive maneuver just above the treetops.

The crew chief hurried past everyone to man the pintle-mounted heavy machine gun, attempting to acquire the target called out by the pilot. He had, at the time, been finishing up the last of the tasks performed whenever the helicopter took off and was therefore not where he would normally have been in a combat zone in order to react faster. They had lost several crewmembers on the ground, making his tasks harder now. All of that is by way of explanation as to how he failed to be able to respond in time to prevent what followed.

Before a single shot was fired, Panacea dove through the open gunner's door and took the crew chief to the deck. With half her hair missing, wounds to her cheek and arm dripping blackish-green ooze, and glassy white eyes, she looked only vaguely like the woman they had rescued from her sister and mother. Biting her prisoner's neck and tearing away his windpipe and jugular easily, she turned to continue her rampage amongst the weaker humans present.

Temple intervened quickly, pulling out her sidearm and discharging a quartet of .45 ACP rounds into the side of the former healer's head and through the view portal on the side of the helicopter, dropping her to the floor. Before anyone could react, she waved people back and away to avoid any possible contact with contaminated fluids.

Tsuruko quickly moved to take control of the gun on the side of the helicopter, spying a bleeding and clearly infected Pegasus. Without hesitation or outward display of emotions, she squeezed the trigger and set the M60 to the task of ending the threat to their vehicle. A few seconds after, she nearly lost her life as the resurrected crew chief stood up after quaking violently and attempted to maul her.

Kyoko bashed the man away from the swordswoman with the stock of her PDW. Now holding a line of fire that wouldn't risk the pilots, she ended the threat, then keyed her microphone. "Corpsman, MOPP up and black bag these two. Everyone else, stand clear of the area! Pilot, what's the status of Two and Three?"

The pilot pushed the engines to move them faster away from the combat zone, catching up with the other two helicopters. "They're reporting all clear, ma'am. What's the word back there?"

"Crew chief is KIA. Aoyama is acting starboard door gunner for the moment. Seta, I need you to man the port side." The general disliked trusting military matters to civilians, but had little choice at the moment. "Mizore, get up front and guide us towards Pilot Ikari. Hera, I need to leave the children in your hands for the moment." Nobody attempted to argue against a good plan, at least nobody that mattered or was heard over the roar of a helicopter in motion.

+++++ Maria's Market. (Sunday + 8)

Minako was not having an easy time deciding what particular emotions she should be experiencing. Shinji had appeared out of thin air, was now covered in the blood of the woman she had been sent to save, and looked like he had been slamming back around six hundred of the beers that her father would drink once a week while watching a baseball game with business associates. He hadn't hesitated in the slightest to kill someone that he had to have known carried a torch for him. He hadn't hesitated to kill. Her voice was raspy as her throat was forced to work before it was back in place, "Shinji?"

The young man's head wobbled as he looked around, taking in who was present. Michiru-san dead?

Haruka was visibly restraining herself from swearing. "No, sweetie, she's just unconscious. Saw something in her mirror that didn't agree with her." Carefully picking Michiru up into a bridal carry, she continued exercising that restraint. "If you think we should get back to the Shrine, let's go. I don't think we can do anything else here."

Yes. Shrine. With an uneven gesture, he created a wall of solid compacted marble to cover the front of the store, preventing easy access to anyone. Dangerous objects. Safer now. True to his word, he began to wobble his way towards the direction of the Shrine.

Rei and Minako moved as one to take positions under his shoulders, steadying him and intending to prevent him from falling over. It was the latter that spoke first, "Shinji, what happened? Are the Angels dead?" The reply she received was a shake of his head in the negative, then a nod of affirmation, then a return to the drunken bobbing from before. "Shinji, if they're still alive we need-"

Volcano…dead. He scowled, whether in confusion or anger only he could say. Very dead. Shrine.

"That is our destination," Rei pinched Minako's side behind Shinji's back to silence the woman, "I agree that we should probably get you there. You look like you need some rest."

No rest. Must hurry. The sound of helicopter rotors began to echo in the alleyway they traversed. Yes. Better. Stopping himself dead, making the others incapable of moving him, he looked around for something. Need flat. Land.

"Ok, you lean on us and we'll get you up to that roof." The Sailor for Mars didn't need to understand the situation to try and work within it. If Shinji felt that the helicopters would be helpful, then the worst that would have to be done is he was protected from whatever it was while they retreated. Human weapons weren't likely to harm any of them, so long as they paid attention.

A few coordinated jumps put everyone on the roof of a mid-sized store. After another moment, a wing of three helicopters changed their bearing to head directly for them. The central bird descending rapidly and hovering just above the edge of the building. The side door slid open, and a youkai that Minako recognized drifted down while creating a ramp of snow for them to climb up. The beautiful yuki-onna didn't bother trying to yell over the propellers, and instead gestured for everyone to move quickly to board.

Those women capable of hearing his thoughts heard Shinji's apology. Sorry. Can't control.

Whatever Mizore replied was limited to him alone, save for the way she reached out and stroked his cheek gently while he sat down. The door was sealed, the helicopter once more moving towards the Shrine. Headsets were placed on the Sailors, even the unconscious Michiru who was being tended to by Temple. It was dark, crowded, and far more tense than any of them expected it to be. None of the Sailors knew the woman who began to speak through the helicopter's radio system, but they did recognize both the tone and bearing of someone in charge.

"Good evening, ladies. Thank you for keeping an eye on Pilot Ikari." Her smile was patient, but contained a strong undertone of a lack of interest in putting up with nonsense. "While I appreciate that you might have had need of him, I would take it as a kindness if you refrained from summoning him somewhere without some form of warning. We have been tasked with coordinating defenses with him, and that will only be made more difficult by not knowing whether or not we'll be able to finish a sentence without him vanishing."

Minako began to defend herself from what had happened before being waved to silence and shown how to press the button which would broadcast her statements in a more audible fashion to the others. "Oh…eh? Oh, that's…I can hear myself." Her thumb was removed from the button by Rei, who glared at her friend in an effort to prevent further embarrassment.

Haruka's voice came through with practiced ease, the older Sailor used to speaking over helicopter headsets owing to her partner's owning one. "We're not sure how it happens ourselves, ma'am. I assure you, we would have much preferred he hadn't shown up. Whatever happened to him, he just murdered someone we were told was necessary to retrieve." Giving an abridged version of the incident, she didn't gloss over anything but also didn't reveal everything. "I think he's gone past the breaking point."

"It is more complex than that." Mizore drew everyone's attention to her with a short wave, to ensure they knew who was speaking. "While we were attempting to defend the Pithos of Pandora…." She trailed off when Minako's head tilted to the side in confusion. "You might know it as Pandora's Box. It was the container for Hope." She gave what she would of their travails the past few days from their perspective, ending with, "Hope is, we believe, now hosted inside of Shinji."

Rei was the fastest to make the expected series of logical steps to react with the appropriate amount of horror. Without pushing the button to make herself audible, she began gesticulating wildly and attempting to explain why it was that a man who came from a place where things were largely mirrored from those present in their own world being the living host of Hope might be a slightly more worrying deal than those present were making it out to be.

Before she could be calmed enough to be shown how to work the technology she detested, the pilot called out that they were approaching the Shrine and that they were being instructed to set the helicopter carrying Shinji down first. Mizore followed that statement with, "We're going to be walking into something really worrying, General. Please, for the sake of peace, keep everyone quiet while I sort out what's going on." She eyed Hera, biting one side of her lips and shaking her head. "You need to stay at my side, and say nothing."

+++++ Hikawa Shrine, Azabu-Juban, Japan. (Sunday + 8)

Shinji, unlike everyone else, had heard what Rei Hino said. As he was being mostly carried out of the helicopter, attempting to walk on his own without any success, he contemplated the possible corollaries that logically flowed from what she had placed before him. A part of him was grateful that it was Tsuruko who was supporting him, as it meant he wasn't being forced to physically touch any of the Sailors. The way his body felt with them against him added even more confusion onto an already laden plate of it.

Standing an appropriate distance away so that everyone could climb down from the UH-60, Suzuhara was glaring at a spot of empty horizon off towards the west. Near him, seated on the ground and huddled against one another, were the vixen triplets in their human forms. Each brightened as Shinji looked at them, giving him a weak smile of greeting.

He felt compelled by honor to urge Tsuruko over towards them, and when he reached the ground before them he pushed himself off of the woman to crumple to the ground on his knees. Sagging forward, bowing with penitent regret, he made an earnest effort to right a wrong in his mind. I…sorry. You…hurt. Safe. Good.

Dragging themselves forward, Mika, Misa, and Miwa pulled him into a group hug. "We are so happy you're not dead." Their typical layered speech was just as tired as they looked. "Things went sideways as soon as we herded the people that were hiding in those buildings to safety. We couldn't get back to you to help, we're sorry that you were hurt!" Positioning him so that he laid amongst them, they soothed away blemishes and worked to fix his hair, allowing Suzuhara to handle everyone else for the moment.

The male kitsune was content to allow them to provide comfort to a man who desperately needed it while he took care of trying to piece together the broken remnants of their situation. Facing the Sailors, Kyoko, Tsuruko, Hera, and Mizore, Suzuhara made a pronouncement that he never thought he'd have to. "The Denmother has lost her fucking mind." Without giving that time to sink in, he gestured to several groups of youkai helping other groups of youkai erect spiritual and physical defenses around the Shrine. "As soon as she heard that I was coming up the hill with these three, she excused herself from the meeting she was in and fucking vanished. It was only after she'd left that people realized that most of the defenses that had been set up were illusory. After what happened at Elysium, I'm fairly sure everyone here knows what we're racing against."

Kyoko frowned at the fortifications, her military mind making rapid assessments. "I am obligated to contact the MoD and let him know what's happening. I'll do what I can to coordinate your forces, if you'd like, but right now he needs to know that Naoko Akagi has gone rogue as well."

She…gone? Shinji's head lolled over to look at Kyoko. Not dead? Irritation flashed in his eyes. Apartment. Come. Now. Weakly fighting to stand, he was swiftly blessed with three assistants who easily hefted him onto his feet. Thank.

"All part of the service package," the trio of kitsune playfully bantered. "You chose the Triple Trouble Trial, you get to be the emotional support Shinji for three girls trying not to cry in public." The pain behind the brave face broke through when their voices hitched before returning to their normal confidence. "You're lucky we've lowered the asking price, you know? Normally we'd charge an arm and a leg."

They had made significant progress towards the building, and as beaten and angry as Shinji was, he wasn't nearly broken enough to take his anger and pain out on them. Lucky, he agreed. Blessed. He attempted to recognize the two Tengu who opened the doors for them, but his head only managed to quake uncontrolled instead of nod.

"Hail, Silent One." The taller of the two knew his heart, and the honor he sought to convey. "Fear not, your Den remains secure, as does all those within."

The elevator was opened by a Kodama child who had been specifically tasked with operating the buttons. The serene look on its pale seafoam green face offered a similar solace as what Shinji received from the Vixens. When the elevator reached capacity, with Minako and Mizore joining the four others for the first trip up, it closed the door and sent them to the top.

Hurt. His mind was so clogged that he could scarcely control what he said mentally. He was so close to being free to speak, being able to use the verbal communication that so many people took for granted. Need…need….

All five women had to help drag him to the apartment after the elevator deposited them on the top floor. The door flew open after they were halfway down the hall, and Ritsuko stepped briskly towards them while directing where they went. "Ok, I set the couch up with a blanket and pillow. I heard from the Corpsman who travelled with you that he's been exposed to pretty heavy cold recently. Is anyone else hurt?"

"Most of us," Minako snorted out. "But he's managed to catch the worst of it, like normal."

"He's tough." The younger, brunette, version of a woman he'd known in a previous life gave him a smile filled with confidence and trust. "That's why he takes the worst of things, because he knows he can handle it."

Shinji wanted to cry. He wanted to scream. Everything was falling apart, the world was coming undone, and nobody understood what was about to happen. Instead of fighting against being set on the couch, or just beginning to bark out demands, he waited until the others arrived to begin. He had a lot of important matters to discuss, and he didn't want to have to repeat himself. Forcing them to allow him to sit, instead of lay, he let them to wrap him in a blanket and set the pillow behind his head. It felt even more wonderful when he suddenly had a lap full of three foxes instead of women, which led him to notice something new. Five.

"It's…been a day." Mika and Miwa were busy positioning themselves in a way that stopped people from crowding him while still laying on him, so Misa spoke for all of them while slowly waving her new limbs. "Periods of intense pressure can lead to us gaining tails, if we survive it."

Gorgeous. Their fox forms were, in truth, breathtaking. Their fur showed signs of the struggle they'd been through, but still radiated with the simple magic of their supernatural being. If his hands weren't trapped, he'd likely have begun attempting to pet them. …Please stay.

All three stopped what they were doing and looked at him in surprise. Without caution or concern, they nodded as one. "As you wish."

The room filled quickly, brief introductions made to familiarize those who hadn't yet met. Kyoko, Tsuruko, Noriyasu Seta, Hera, Rei, Suzuhara, and Daphne were joined by the aged Mujina that Shinji had met and the Jorōgumo that had made his clothing. After he had everyone's attention, he forced himself to speak slowly and clearly. "Is Naoko Akagi dead?" His voice was weak, and he couldn't put any more force in it without losing control of it entirely. When Kyoko shook her head in the negative, he choked back a curse. "She might know how to initiate Second Impact. We need to find her." He refused to look at Ritsuko, knowing that what he was saying would hurt the woman that had only ever sought to help him. "She knows things she shouldn't. Things she couldn't. If she reaches where she was asking us to go, we might not be able to stop the end of everything. We're risking everything letting her run free."

"Phone." Kyoko turned to look around the room, seeking where the telephone would be. Accepting the cordless from Ritsuko, she hastily dialed a very long number. "I'm not entirely sure what 'Second Impact' means, aside from the obvious intimation that there was a First, but if it bothers a man who goes toe-to-toe with gods and demons, I'll assume it's bad." Stepping into the kitchen, she began speaking counter phrases to verify her identity.

"Second Impact…destroyed my world." With the odd sensations running riot through him, he couldn't focus enough to go into great detail. "Humanity didn't help afterwards. We need…we need…."

"You need rest." Seta motioned for Shinji to remain calm, trying to stop the panic attack he believed he saw building in the younger man. "Finding one woman isn't going to be difficult if the military starts looking. Especially since almost everyone knows Doctor Naoko Akagi. We'll set up defenses here, you…you let these lovely young ladies help you unwind. The last thing we need is for you to lose control of that armor in the middle of a heavily populated area."

Who controls Unit-01? The question had been bugging him ever since that strange voice asked him. Several times people had told him that he was in control. The only time he'd ever truly lost control of it was either when he was unconscious, or when his mother stole control entirely and removed the Evangelion from around him. He hadn't heard her voice when Naoko caused the Eva to crawl out and attempt to kill her the first time he met her. He hadn't felt like someone else was trying to move it. He was reacting with hostility to her. He was the one who managed to fight back. He couldn't fight back when his mother stole it, and he was awake at the time it tried to kill Naoko. "Misato told me that the Eleventh Angel was a virus that attached itself to the Magi. That it attempted to convince the three parts of the Magi to initiate the self-destruct sequence for the GeoFront." He was making leaps in logic, and not filling people in regarding the gaps, but if he was right he couldn't waste time trying to prove it out fully. "I think…I think Naoko Akagi is the Eleventh Angel."

To her credit, Ritsuko looked at the situation from Shinji's perspective and applied everything he'd told her about his world instead of reacting with incredulity or familial piety. "Those Magi you described to me, they're made using a brain scan of the Naoko Akagi from your world. The Angel infected them. You came here, and those Angels showed up. If those Angels are reproductions of the Angels you fought once, then it would make sense that the virus Angel came too. It knew enough of my mother's brain to make a copy, or just co-opt her whole. The logic is sound."

Minako coughed out a nervous laugh. "None of that made very much sense to me, but I'll accept it makes sense to you. If all of this is true, then what do we need to do? This Akagi-san is an Angel, that means stopping it just got a lot harder without Shinji-kun."

"I already have people working on finding her, and scouting for other sources of those…things." Kyoko came back into the room, handing Ritsuko the phone with a nod of thanks. "They're informing their counterparts in nearby nations, and anyone that has the capacity to access the excavation site or known Elysian portals. We've put out a request for a Red Notice through Interpol for known associates as well. If she's anywhere near a government or military site, they'll send up a flare. I told them to be cautious about her possibly being extranormal." Pressing on with what control she had over the conversation at the moment, she looked to Minako and Rei. "I'd like you two, at least, to travel with a QRF I'm sending to her most likely destination."

Shinji attempted to shake his head, though it still looked more akin to a wobble. "No. They're not able to hurt an Angel."

"And you're barely able to stand." Crossing the space between them, she perched on the coffee table and gently set her hands on his knees. "If she shows up there, and she is actually an Angel, then their ability to summon you across long distances will allow them to bring you to them. You need actual downtime, or all you're going to be is a liability on the battlefield. Let them sit in a crowded transport for a while. Let them scout out the area. When it's time, they'll call you in to do what needs doing."

Hera drew attention to herself with a small wave. "I'll go with them, Slayer. As you saw with…honored Apollo, we're able to at least hold off even an Angel for a time. I will lend my strength to your allies, to show you that I am willing to earn my place at your side."

Minako was chewing on her lower lip, turning the plan this way and that in her mind. Eventually she shrugged, unable to come up with anything better. "General-san isn't wrong. You've been fighting for a week straight, and whatever happened in Elysium-"

"What happened was he has been infected with…with…anti-Hope!" Rei moved over to stand next to the couch, gesturing around Shinji's head and speaking rapidly. "Every time I tried to heal him of his spiritual woes, what happened? He lost control, and began attacking me. His armor co-opted everyone's abilities except for mine and Usagi-chan's. We're the healers! Usagi-chan wasn't able to heal him after that first time, like…like his body became vaccinated against it. Mine he just reacted with outright hostility. Artemis and Luna…." She looked at Hera. "Friends of ours who are Mautians, not the Greek gods you're probably thinking of. Anyway," she swept her gaze across the crowd, "they told us that he resonates with Black Moon energy. We're all, or at least we Sailors are, White Moon. There was a lot of debate about whether or not that meant that we were all opposites of what we might have been back on his world. If his Black is our White, and our Black is his White, then maybe our Hope is his…well, anti-Hope!"

Shinji frowned, something striking his memory at an odd angle. Without thinking through what he was doing, he worked one hand free of the blanket and reached over to touch Kyoko's face bandage. "I don't like this." Deliberate motions pried the medical plasters free. "I should have protected you. I should have protected all of you." His mind, free to remember the recent past, kept itself detached from his motions. "I…think I know how…." With the bandage gone, he got a good look at the wound that would ruin something ethereally beautiful with a coarse ridge of scarred flesh. Kyoko Soryu was everything Asuka Langley Soryu might have been, had the latter been raised by the former. Slowly trailing his finger along the wound, he exuded a fungal formation from the tip of that digit that eagerly bound her skin together. "I was standing in the kitchen. I was making…making breakfast." Wiping what he'd done off of her, he scowled at the obvious scar tissue that had formed. Another slow tracing with his finger brought another type of medicine to the fore. "I heard a voice…dark, light, evil, good…it was everything at once. It was more powerful than anything I've ever known."

Mika watched, amused, as Shinji learned how to use the gifts he'd been given without instruction. "We had to sing for him in order to stop him from trying to kill himself. He was touched by the Haunting Dark, and even the strongest mind doesn't do well with that the first time."

Wiping away the last treatment, he tilted his head and examined his handiwork. "I think…I think what I heard wasn't one voice speaking. I think it was a bunch of voices from the same mouth." Unless you looked uncomfortably close, you'd never know that Kyoko would have been injured. "I think it said, 'White is black is white is black is white is black is white'."

A light blush sat on Kyoko's cheeks, her military bearing the only reason she was not more than simply a pale pink as she was carefully examined by a handsome and attentive young man. "How does it look?"

"The same as it did before, and after, I failed to protect you." He sat back, still thinking through what he heard in Makoto's kitchen. "Gorgeous, professional, brilliant. 'This world is not your world, this reality has to become your reality'." With the one free hand he had, he pulled the pillow out from behind his back where it had fallen and tossed it aside. "It all seemed like gibberish, sentences layered over sentences. I think it was a warning."

"It would hearten us greatly if you chose to make this your reality," Daphne dry-washed her hands nervously as she spoke. "To know that a Titan once more walked the Earth…that we could shelter beneath your protection…."

"A Titan, an Elder. 'They'll never love you, you'll always be second best to a rotting corpse'." His anger hadn't dissipated, it was simply now biding its time. "I think I understand why everything's going wrong. It's all about choice."

Ritsuko easily read what most of the others were failing to, and moved to sit down by him. "Shinji, that's all life is. We make a choice, we live with the consequences. Cause and effect from the moment we're born to the moment we die." Taking the hand he'd freed to work on Kyoko, she tried to soothe the now Zen-level of anger.

"I'm not sure I'd say 'we' there. 'Dreams are lies, nightmares are truths, freewill is a myth, destiny is fact'." He gave Ritsuko a cold smile. He honestly cared about her life. He cared far more for her life than his own. "This isn't your fault. None of this is."

Tsuruko was gripping the hilt of her sword hard enough to cause physical pain. She, like Ritsuko, knew what was about to happen. She had seen its like before, and could read his aura like an open book. "Shinji-dono, if any here have erred somehow…I would beg that you allow them to right their ship peacefully. There is no need-"

"The most important thing it said, and I'm just now understanding it. Understanding that it doesn't just apply to me. 'You will not choose this for them, they must decide this for themselves'." Shinji closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He had tried to control it. He had tried to keep his temper from boiling over. They didn't deserve to be scolded for what had happened. They couldn't have known. "I was maneuvered into position, flawlessly. They knew what I was going to do, as I was doing it. They knew where to strike, when to strike, and how to strike. Now they know part of the plan to stop them." Carefully lifting and setting down each of the Triplets where they were no longer pinning him to the couch, he stood up and tossed the blanket over to where the pillow had been. "I'm infected." He wanted to punch mountains in space, he was so angry. "Inari infected me the night I broke the table, right over there," he gestured to the spot where the table had been repaired, "and I sat there and let it happen…because I was too stupid to keep myself calm." Moving towards the room he'd been given, he felt his control wane. "Whatever you're going to do, leave me out of it."

Minako hated to see a good man suffer, and hated even more the thought of Shinji not being in control of his own actions. Reaching for what she had experience with, what she could speak to without extemporizing, she said the worst thing she could have at that point, "Shinji-kun, General-san is going to be able to help you. She can ask the government for help! If you're infected with something, they can help…or we can ask the youkai for help! There's hope for-"

"Hope? Hope?!" Shinji threw his hand back out towards the world outside. "There wasn't even the illusion of hope before I was blasted through that fucking jar! Before I arrived here the world out there was just climbing down from the brink of a war between two nations armed with around eighteen million ass-tons of nuclear weapons, not because they suddenly gained sanity but because one side couldn't afford to pay their fucking troops anymore leading to a critical lack of support for an attempted coup that would have served to continue the Cold War. Nations were sending spies to assassinate people for believing in a differing form of financial markets and over which type of slavery was more ethical! I learned in history class what you're still living through, and let me tell you that it never got better! Decades later, even after Second Impact wiped out most of the Southern Hemisphere, the first thing governments around the world did was lob nuclear weapons at one another!" Drawing scare quotes with his fingers, he gained steam, "Some 'peace accords' were drawn up that limited the bloodshed afterwards to guerrilla campaigns and terrorist actions. The 'United' Nations, as hilarious a concept as that's ever been, controlled everything with an iron fist through five of the remaining major world powers because doing anything else would risk the few remaining people on Earth killing each other out of stupidity! Now you think that suddenly they're going to get their act together in time to deal with whatever monsters we ran from at Elysium? That they'll be able to stop Second Impact from destroying another world? You sit here and preach to me about hope…." His lip twitched, fighting bravely against the urge to just scream in meaningless rage. "There is no hope. There never has been. There is when the suffering begins at birth, there is when the suffering ends at death, and there is whatever useless nonsense you try to do between those two points in time to affect a change that will be rendered meaningless by future idiots. Now you can sit here and hope that the killing stops while I figure out how to kill the right people to stop them from killing wrong people, or you can go jump off the fucking roof if you'd prefer. I'm through trying to talk sense into anyone." The door slamming behind him as he entered his room left no doubt in their minds as to his sincerity.

A heavy silence hung over those he left behind. Some worried that a young man had just been pushed past the breaking point. Some were nervous that a being of nearly incomparable power had just told them they were on their own. Some sought to calm their own emotional turmoil, knowing that he was also nervous, scared, and seemingly alone against impossible odds. Most were startled when a gravelly old voice sighed out, "I'm glad we reinforced that beam." The old Mujina that had gifted Shinji her people's aid scratched at her neck, looking up to the spider in the shape of a woman next to her. "I think you're not wrong about adding another floor, giving him his own space."

The Jorōgumo shrugged simply, her voice oozing with confident sensuality, "Of course I'm right. I've never once known a man that didn't need to blow off steam from time to time. They know how to fix things, they see the problems that everyone else ignores, but they don't have the capacity, capability, or influence to affect those changes…it's a perpetual cycle of frustration at their own impotence, their inability to protect the people they love." She gestured to the room where Shinji had retreated to, pairing it with a pained smile. "He's been repressed for almost two decades. Getting him to release that without killing someone in the process is going to be the real challenge."

"I've seen similar cases before," Kyoko stood up and straightened the toga she wore, "too much pressure leading to an eruption at an inconvenient time. He knows that we're not to blame, and he tried not to take it out on us. We," she emphasized the word to stress that while there were some parties more guilty than others, nobody was individually responsible, "know the best thing for it is to try and get him to see medical professionals. We have to determine if he actually is infected with something, and how to counteract that infection. Unless there are any objections, I'd like to task Corpsman Temple with leading that effort for the time being. We need to set up defenses to keep this hill from being swarmed by the…." She failed to find a word appropriate to describe their latest enemy.

"Zombies." Suzuhara spread his hands helplessly when everyone looked at him as if he'd gone daft. "Ok. I'm willing to listen to alternatives. We all watched someone die, go through violent spasms, and rise up to try and gnaw on people who in turn die, go through violent spasms, and rise up to repeat the damn process. Whatever is causing these things has managed to infect at least sixty-two distinct types of life that I saw, which means that it's gone well beyond almost any other infectious substance I've ever heard of in terms of crossing the species barrier. Until someone else volunteers a better word, I'm calling them zombies."

"The nomenclature is unimportant," the General cut off any protests before they could gain steam by speaking firmly and clapping loudly, "just as calling the other oddities 'Angels' is unimportant. It will allow us to discuss them without having to crack a thesaurus every time we wish to reference them, and so we will go with that for now." Pointing firmly with a 'knife hand' to the door out of the apartment, she urged everyone to start moving. "We need to set up defenses, triage supplies and stockpiles, and prepare for a number of missions. None of that requires us being in this apartment where Pilot Ikari is resting. Let's move with a purpose."

+++++ Shinji's Room. (Sunday + 8)

Shinji regretted slamming the door to his room instantly. It was a childish, petty…Asuka-like thing to do, and none of the people in the room he'd just left deserved it. He wanted to go back out and apologize, and for once not because it was the quickest way out of a social situation for him. He had been wrong, and apologizing would start to make it right. The problem he faced, however, was that he could still feel the acidic rage holding his heart in an unbreakable grip. He knew it was a problem, but he couldn't see a solution.

"One does have to wonder," a scholarly, curious, male voice spoke from the far side of the bedroom near the windows, "at your capacity to see the unvarnished truth and yet somehow still reach the polar opposite conclusion which that truth details." Lithion was perched on the windowsill, his omnipresent tome of knowledge closed about his thumb. "You have an amazing mind, Silent One, it's a shame you have no control over it."

Tungsram, or as she'd asked to be called, Carla, bounced a small, still-wrapped candy off of the other youma's forehead from her place at the sliding glass door that led to the balcony. "Do not burden him with your feeble attempts at wit." Turning her attention to Shinji, she inclined her head in apology. "I am dreadfully sorry that we did not announce our presence, but I did not feel it was the right place or time for introductions. Many of those out there do not view our kind in a positive light, and risking conflict would only aid it's goals."

He'd retreated here to stop himself from hurting people. He'd meant to take a few moments, maybe an hour, to get his head together. He knew, deep in the darkest pits of his soul, that he had been manipulated into somehow supporting the madness that had been brought to this world. Now, standing before him, was yet another group that had come to him for help. More people that he might very well have failed by unknowingly being infected. He couldn't think of what to say. All that bubbled up his throat was a scream of impotent rage begging to be unleashed. His body began to quake, once more, and just as things seemed darkest…he was being hugged.

Carla stroked her hand along his back, her chin resting on his shoulder as she gave him what peace she could. "We have not lost yet. You don't have all of the data you need, and you're not responsible for nearly as much as you believe you are." Her heart eased as his body ceased the violent trembling. "The General is correct, you need to rest. There are matters afoot which will limit the harm that is possible for the time being, and you would be best served letting your body recuperate from your recent injuries."

Lithion bolstered her plea, while asking for permission to help in his own way, "If you will allow it, we can take this discussion into the realm housed within your person. Time will pass far more slowly outside as we share what we have learned, and the inability to speak falsely there to you can only bolster our words."

There was a danger in accepting, in his mind. His words came out harsh and raw, an accusatory undertone that he did not wish to be present, "Doesn't that risk infecting you two?"

"No." Carla kept her hands on his torso, but stepped back to look him in the eyes as she spoke, "You are not 'infected' in the way that you are thinking you are. It is not transmissible, nor is it incurable. It is inconvenient-"

"And appalling," Lithion added solemnly.

"-but it will not harm anyone else within you." For once, she wasn't irritated at being interrupted. To her mind, Shinji needed to hear more often than he had been that his situation was not acceptable. "We'll go in, speak on what we've learned in your absence, let you speak to us regarding what has passed, and do what we can to help you." By this point she was accustomed to him having a difficult time making eye contact, and when his eyes wandered elsewhere it wasn't unexpected. When they locked firmly onto something, however, she noted the small hint of surprise and curiosity. Following his gaze to the piano which had drawn his attention, she hit on a new plan to begin soothing him. "Why don't you play a song, before we all step inside? Music is well known to soothe the savage beast, and I would love to bear witness to your talent."

"…I…." Shinji's voice grew quiet, the pathway for sound seeming to diminish as his anger calmed through Clara's touch, "This room didn't have a piano before."

Lithion cast a concerned glance at Clara. "The Mujina had one brought here, after the Kodama clan mentioned your habit of underpinning your thoughts with pieces of classical music from both pianists and cellists. They presumed the cello in the other room was one you would be given easy access to, and wished to ensure you had a proper piano for those times when you needed one."

He nodded slowly, accepting the statement as true based solely on the lack of a need to lie about something like that. He hadn't understood the concern the youma had expressed, though he also hadn't understood much of anything of late. After carefully freeing himself of Clara's touch, he slowly walked over and sat down at the piano bench. The wood was a rich, warm, mahogany with just enough red to give the brown life. The design was upright, but far deeper than was normal for the typical space-saving variation of a piano. His foot pressed gently on the soft pedal, his fingers danced along a series of arpeggios, his brow knit at the lustrous timbre of the notes as they washed over him. The instrument must have been crafted by a master, and he would have to find them to find out how much the instrument had cost them to produce. Reversing the arpeggios he had just played, then toying with the various progressions, and finally without warning he broke into the third movement of the Moonlight Sonata. His body moved as it had been trained to, fingers and feet working together and separately to create the exact sound that meant he would be allowed to eat that evening. The murky joy of knowing that he had become a master of something his 'Sensei' never had feeding his spirit, giving life to the horrors within the darkness.

Unseen by Shinji, trapped as he was in a past that would never truly let him go, Clara carefully opened the door to the bedroom. She had felt the vast majority of the powerful presences outside leave not long after Shinji had entered the room, then had felt a lone presence enter the apartment and move towards the bedroom with a sense of duty. She had thought it to be the other woman who lived in the apartment, and was surprised when it was someone she had not yet met. Bowing her head in silent greeting, she was at least comforted to know that the human woman understood enough of what was happening to not cry out at the sight of her inhuman pallor, or to interrupt the performance in progress.

Lithion simply smiled helplessly and shrugged when the woman looked towards him curiously. He knew, from how Shinji's spirit reacted to the new woman, that she was the furthest thing from a 'threat' that was available at the moment. He recognized the way she stood, the way she carried her rucksack, and the way she was comfortable with the sidearm at her hip that she was trained and professional. Her presence didn't diminish what he hoped to accomplish, and so he had no need to make an issue out of it.

When, after too short a time by the standards of the audience, the song came to a close, Shinji let his fingers trail towards him along the length of the keys with a featherlight touch. His words came out with only just enough power to be heard, "It's a fine instrument…worth far more than I am."

"I believe that would depend on the buyer, Pilot," Temple's voice brought Shinji's head around. Giving muted, but heartfelt, applause she let her eyes express that she disagreed with his assessment of himself. "I'm sorry for interrupting, but General Soryu asked me to gather some blood samples and get a feel for how you're doing physically. You've been pushed through a lot lately, and neither she nor I want you coming apart at the seams. Good men are hard to find, and tend to stop being good if they're not given proper maintenance."

Clara's voice whispered into his mind, It wouldn't be a terrible thing to allow. Her concern is genuine, at least.

Shinji opened his mouth to speak and found that nothing would come out. His teeth clacked as his jaw shut, his eyes displaying a variety of emotional states amidst his confusion.

"We were just about to help him lie down," Clara moved over to help Shinji stand, blocking Temple's view of his face long enough to calm him. As you have accepted a vow of silence, the laws governing this reality only allow you to speak in a place you feel is 'safe', that you feel is 'home'. Considering what's been happening it is no shock that you are doubting your place in the world. Let me claim fatigue for you, no reason to worry everyone over something repairable. His quick nod of agreement coincided with her helping him to his feet. "He would be grateful for your aid, miss. He is coming down from a recent emotional high, and his voice is not consistently available to him."

Temple's slight frown demonstrated that she was too polite to call out the lie she knew she was being fed, and her statement proved that she wasn't interested in rocking the boat if it meant that she had a chance to try and help, "Of course. I apologize, ma'am, but I don't believe we've met. I'm Corpsman Temple, OPCON to General Soryu's unit via CNFJ."

"A Corpsman is an indispensable member of many military's forward deployed elements, they work as a doctor of sorts trained to deal with any number of battlefield injuries." Lithion spoke mostly for Shinji's benefit, but also to intimate that his confederate might not understand the acronym salad that had just been delivered. "OPCON, or Operational Control, is a term that is used to indicate that someone is no longer directly working with the unit they hail from, and are instead temporarily on loan to another unit to fill a need. CNFJ is what the United States Navy refers to the overall organization of those elements deployed to Japan to uphold treaty obligations and provide for defense." Once Shinji was on the bed, the blue youma waggled his book to draw attention to it. "I study a broad array of topics myself, and appreciate that it can be a habit to speak in the terms one is familiar with, despite others not having become so learned."

"Ah, yes. Of course, my apologies." Her lips curled slightly into a self-effacing smile at the polite correction. "May I ask your name, sir?"

"Jakob. Jakob Berzelius." Bowing in a more Western style, he continued the introductions, "My esteemed colleague here is Carla Scheele. We recently made the acquaintance of the Silent One, and have been making an effort to bridge cultural gaps between ourselves and those others you've recently met."

Temple's eyebrow rose slowly. "Tungsten," she pointed to Carla, "and lithium," to Lithion. "Is this more of that name magic? I don't wish to put you out by being rude, if you have a title, or a rank, I would be fine addressing you with those."

"A little too on the nose, I suppose," Carla chuckled ruefully. "Yes, we prefer to use those pseudonyms because they avoid the problems you've touched upon. While you might not have the capacity to harm us, even if you could form the sounds required to give voice to our actual names, it's best not to hand a loaded weapon to someone who doesn't know how to use it, don't you agree?"

Shinji was, once again, lying down on a mattress that was no less than seven million times more comfortable than anything he'd ever touched back where he'd come from. Surrounded without being crowded by a lean, urbane, blue-skinned gentleman and two women who, while both beautiful, could not have been more different than one another. Carla's inhuman skin tone highlighted and accentuated the otherworldly, alien, beauty she possessed. The almost-but-not-quite human figure that lounged indolently in the uncanny valley, the perfection by way of a million imperfections, everything about her was as it should be in his mind…just with an echo of being wrong. Temple, on the other hand, was someone who hadn't been gifted genetic perfections. Her hair was naturally a plain, dull, black, pulled back in a short ponytail that would be easy to manage in a rush. The color wasn't dark enough to make it pop out like many Westerners preferred, nor was the shade deep enough to give it the contrasting highlights that many found intriguing. Her figure was the result of constant work, diet, and exercise more than luck. Her hips were wide enough to give her balance in a fight, her legs thick enough to enable the violent motions required as well. Her shoulders were broad enough to be mistaken for a man's, and her bust was modestly noticeable. The one thing, if any one thing on her drew more attention than another, that he noted was that her eyes were constantly assessing everything without demonstrating significant motion or emotion. She saw far more than she let on, and she only let on what she wanted others to see. It was fortunate, in his heart, that at the moment he saw a gentle kindness one might display for a wounded animal in need of a soft touch. What do I need to do for her? He looked between Lithion and Tungsram. To make her happy?

Before his partner could say anything, Lithion took advantage of Shinji's wording to leverage a potentially beneficial outcome. "The Silent One has asked to get to know you better. He has taken note of your intellect, which even I must say is rare in one as young as you."

Temple snorted at the comment. "I'm twenty eight, and have ten years in the military doing my job. I'm no more intelligent than anyone else who's spent the requisite time to gain and practice a skill. I'd say he's probably smarter than I am, with how he's managed to learn how to operate that machine he's fused with, play the piano better than my old church-marm, and figure out how to use whatever magic they've foisted on him. Anyone can hone a single skill, but to show more than aptitude for at least three very complex skills? That requires a keen mind." She dropped to a knee by the bedside. "Pilot, do I have your permission to check your-" She paused, freezing in the motion of gesturing along his torso with one hand as he grasped her forearm gently and closed his eyes with a grimace.

…Can she please call me Shinji? He was done being a pilot. Done holding that weight up. Everyone was right, he needed rest and he needed it in the form of letting go of the duties of his office for just a few hours. Please?

"He would prefer you use what was his given name," Carla translated for the uninitiated. "His physical wounds are the least of the traumas he carries, and the human part of him…would like the human present to treat him as such for a time."

"Ah," Temple nodded slowly, "of course." Rotating her arm, she gripped his forearm in kind and gently lowered both to the mattress. "I apologize, Shinji. I'm Navy, through and through, and it is considered inappropriate for us to not refer to fellow military members by their duty rating, title, or rank without some form of interpersonal relationship established. I'll try to remember to not do that with you, but I can't promise habit won't kick in. You might not be a part of my military, but you are certainly part of a military."

Unlike almost every other person he spent time with of late, Temple's touch didn't cause any significant emotions one way or another. It was glorious to experience such perfect neutrality. Can…can she tell me her name? If I use it, will it hurt her?

Lithion once again cut over Carla, maneuvering the situation to better suit the outcomes he hoped for, "Is there a chance that he might be given permission to reciprocate?"

"Ah…Temple is my name. My only name." She shrugged her shoulders, familiar with the confusion that her situation causes. "According to the Navy, my first name is 'NFN', my middle name is 'NMI', and my surname is Temple. According to Reverend Mother Schmidt, I'm mononymous because Temple is the only thing I would respond to for the first dozen or so years of my life."

That's…. The irony of the fact that he was about to call something 'weird' when he himself existed as he did caused him to suddenly forget his anger for a moment of actual silent laughter. With her arm in his hand, his arm in hers, and an unexpected fit of good humor presenting itself, he looked at the woman known only by one name and attempted to share his thinking. I'm an Elder, a Titan, a human, a Child, and a Pilot. And I'm sitting here about to say that you only having one name is strange. I think something might actually be wrong with me.

Temple gave him a smile after the translation that lit up her face. Relaxing her natural formality further, impressed by the nature of a man that was ten years her junior who had faced things more terrifying than she'd thought possible, she agreed with a laugh, "That would be why I'm here, after all." It was a tiny spark of connection, but she had built things from worse in the past. "Let's see about getting the tests out of the way, so you can get some actual sleep."

+++++ Author's Notes:

Guest: RE: Olympus.

If Chaos was the only enemy on the board, that might actually mean that there was hope for everyone.

JaceSterne: RE: Shinji and Lilith.

That poor woman forgets from time to time that she can't run unopposed in everything she wants to do. It's a part of who she is, and who she'll be. But, as you say, she'll control it because the reward for doing so is large enough that she doesn't want to risk losing it.

Ghost Man: RE: The Wanderer.

He said as much in YA(N)C, there's always a bigger fish out there. As much as he'd love to be able to resolve everything through peace...well, there's always some stupid idiot trying to ice skate uphill.