Friends watch each other's backs. Except Asuka.
First a bit more trivia:
Gendo Ikari
Race: Dragonborn,
Class: Paladin. Oath breaker.(used to be Oath of devotion like Shinji)
Alignment: Neutral Evil
Notes: Has his lackeys do most of the fighting for him. Despite being a paladin, has very low health. No healing or support skills or spells. Only damage skills.
Ritsuko Akagi
Race: Half elf
Class: Warlock
Alignment: Lawful good (Not yet fully reformed since Neutral good is the best)
Notes: Very high Intelligence. Very low everything else. Is immensely distrusted by Shinji and the other main characters despite being very well intentioned. Carries a very tragic past of being an orphan like Shinji.
Kaworu Nagisa
Race: Dwarf
Class: Cleric
Alignment: Lawful good
Notes: Seeks redemption for the dark powers bestowed to him by his evil god and his terrible past that he had no control over.
Rei was shaking and shivering like it was a frosty winter morning as she walked alongside Shinji and Mari towards Mari's blue SUV instead of the lovely hot summer evening.
Saying what she said in Shinji's apartment to Asuka had felt great, but now that the adrenaline rush had left her and seeing the redhead's final expression as she closed the door to leave, she could not help but feel a little guilty and scared.
She had said every word that an unemotive introvert with nary a rudimentary grasp of the science of human interactions shouldn't have been able to say.
She had undertaken every action that the least popular girl in school should not have been able to do to the most popular girl with the largest sphere of influence.
She still remembered the tingling wave of excitation she felt as she had Asuka completely pinned down in her arms, forcing her to feel the complete and utter helplessness she and most likely Shinji had been feeling all their life, and it crushed her conscience just to wonder if in those moments where she only to deliver righteous judgement she had instead gone mad with power instead.
Between the lingering battle with her conscience and how tired she was from keeping a constant grip on Asuka even despite her enhanced strength as an artificial human, Rei drifted off unable to say anything more as Mari drove the car to the festival with her and Shinji in the backseat, their seatbelts fastened.
She fell onto Shinji's shoulder as sleep overcame her, causing Shinji to nearly faint with embarrassment as he took a look at her completely peaceful face before steeling himself and putting his arm around her as she lay.
So, this was the warmth of human contact.
Everything seemed smooth at first. Rei continued to smile serenely as she snored quietly as the ride continued. It was when they got halfway that her expression began to twist slowly but surely from one of absolute contentment, to one of complete shock and fright.
It was a slow and subtle change at first, but she would wake to find Shinji desperately calling her name with a look of pure panic for her wellbeing.
…
An explosion rocked the silent dark void that was the place of rest and respite from the harshness of reality. A massive, loud explosion which seemed to rock Rei's very mind with its magnitude.
The sound of screams echoed across her subconscious mind, mingled with the insufferable crashing of collapsing rubble.
A massive cross shot several meters into the red and maroon sky which seemed to materialize out of thin air in her dream. The unmistakable sign of an impact.
Roaring laughter filled the air, mingling among the cries of the dying in a twisted sort of sarcasm.
Multiple voices, hooting, giggling, chuckling and guffawing all at once.
Among them Rei made out the unmissable voice of Gendo Ikari, her creator, laughing the hardest among the rest and being the last to stop. He had won. He had initiated human instrumentality and doomed the Earth and everyone on it in the process.
Her view of the lucid dream drifted downward from the high place in the sky where she could see Earth in its entirety to a mostly empty beach which would have looked mostly unharmed and nice if it wasn't for the orange LCL fluid scattered around the sands.
Laying there clutching each other's hands, were the last two survivors of mankind. The nicest pacifist and the meanest antagonist. A Japanese boy and a German girl. Shinji and Asuka.
The boy slowly stood up and walked a few steps to the girl. He bent down with outstretched arms, clearly intending to give her a hug to express his relief that she was still safe along with his jubilation that of all the people he could have ended up with in this dying planet, she was the one.
And for all her faults and all the mistakes she had made over the years they had been together prior to the world's destruction, he still loved her and was looking forward to a lifetime of simple pleasure in their union.
But as his smiling face connected with hers, she looked upon him with a look of pure hatred.
"How disgusting" she nonchalantly spat, as if his presence was more of a bother to her than the destruction of the rest of the world and the loss of everyone she had known.
And as the dreaming Rei could only helplessly watch, Asuka quickly raised her two arms and began to strangle Shinji. Shinji choked and gasped but Asuka showed him no respite and calmly continued to tighten her grip on his unprotected neck like a wrench tightening around a bolt.
The boy coughed out a few drops of blood as his eyes began to roll shut. The girl grinned.
The last two survivors of instrumentality had become the last survivor. And the last survivor, was a complete and utter jerk with not a care in the world for the race whose extinction she had indirectly caused through her misconduct and pride.
It was over. It was all over. SEELE had won, Gendo had triumphed and Asuka had gotten away with everything.
But worst of all, Shinji, her Shinji was dead.
Then everything vanished and she woke up, sweating all over with her hairs on end and her eyes unable to stop blinking.
….
"Wake up Rei. Wake up" Shinji anxiously pleaded as Rei's eyes snapped opened.
"No. not again. I've had this dream so many times before, but somehow it feels more real this time." Rei whispered extremely frightfully to herself unheard by the boy who gave her purpose in life, her eyes turned away from him so as not to burden him with her petty little problems which should have been material concerns to him after all he had been through for her already.
"Why do I have to dream such terrible things?" she angrily chastised herself as she turned to look back at Shinji with an expression as close to normality as she could manage.
"Nothing Shinji. I'm fine. Really" she insisted, managing a grimacing smile through sheer willpower as she said this despite the painful salty water rapidly flooding into her tear ducts.
"Look Shinji. We've arrived." She quickly announced upon seeing the car stop in a parking lot on the verge of a outdoor plaza filled with stalls and people both adults and children dress in yukata's just like them, determined to change the subject to keep the unease left upon her from her nightmare hidden.
She couldn't risk putting more pressure on Shinji which might poison him against her again. Not now. Not when he might still run charging back to Asuka the instant he saw that she was anything less than better than that tyrannical villain in every way.
Asuka simply wanted to appear flawless. And now Rei wanted to actually become flawless down to the last detail. And the first rule of flawlessness as far as she was concerned from her years spent holding her tongue in cramped NERV meetings rooms full of nonstop bickering and verbal beatdowns which could ignite at the drop of a hat, was to say as little of her problems to anyone as possible.
If she didn't state her fears to Shinji, he wouldn't know she had them. And if he didn't know she had them, he wouldn't feel troubled by them and they couldn't hurt him even if they could hurt her.
Ignorance is bliss, as the old saying often went.
She forced herself to keep her head held high as she walked alongside Shinji and Mari into the thick of the very lively event lit with beautifully designed lanterns.
It was their night out but mostly Shinji's night out, and she fully intended to make it his best night ever.
The night began with a lovely trip to the Sushi stand where the three pilots ate their faces off. Being an EVA pilot was tough work and the sight of so much cultural cuisine made them drool with addiction at every mouthful.
Tough to say which exotic dish was the best, but then again none of them kept track anyway since it was all so delicious.
They wandered the festival for a bit, enjoying the sumptuous sights of ancient cultural Japan pre-impact, or as best as it could be recreated in the tough times the world was now going through.
They stopped occasionally to say hello to some of the other festival attendants, all of who wore Yukatas just like them. Shinji noticed as they walked that Rei seemed especially eager to keep her hand in his and very unwilling to let him pull away. And as introverted and antisocial Asuka had made him through her years of physical and verbal abuse, he could not help but welcome Rei's intimate embrace of her hand in his and her shoulder leaning against him.
He could not help but relish this wonderful roll reversal where for just once in his life, he felt wanted. He felt needed. He felt that if he were to die right now eaten alive by an alien abomination whose only purpose was to kill and eat everything that wasn't its own kind, it would be alright since at least he would be remembered fondly by just one person who had not taken his attempts at kindness for granted after all.
His first, last and only wish had truly been granted after all.
"Please. Don't let go Shinji. Not yet at least." Rei implored as the happy noises of the festival seemed to fade out of reality the further, they walked hand in hand, looking at each other with deep loved filled eyes as the world around them turned to a blur. "Keep this going a little longer. For me."
"I won't let go Rei. I won't…" Shinji began to reply only to be cut off mid-sentence as three large teenagers clad in pitch black Yukata's strode out from behind a stall in front of them and reality came back upon him once again.
They stepped in front of the three pilots blocking their way, sneering with clenched fists and teeth.
It was clear they were spoiling for a fight.
"So you're the pathetic, worthless one they call Shinji Ikari." The raven haired largest of the gang proclaimed as he sized up the three pathetic little shrimps him and his gang were holding up, his words directed at the only boy among them.
"The one who got to be an EVA pilot just because he has a dad in high places, while we don't."
"Um…no. It's not like that. Please, just let us go." Shinji pleadingly begged only for the bullies smile to intensify tenfold. It was clear his fear and terror were most gratifying to them.
He very nearly wished Asuka was here to help him, only brushing away the stupid thought upon realizing that she would most likely not care enough to do anything but leave him to his fate.
"Your dad treats you sooooo well. He gives you everything while he leaves us to STARVE!" the ringleader retorted, beginning to raise his fists as his two lackeys followed suit.
"He'd rather choose pathetic little piglets like you and your two little pathetic excuses of friends when he has people like us."
"But I don't like pilot…" he tried to say only to be cut off once again as the bullies took a step forward.
"You broke my heart you miserable little faggot. You took all of the great and wonderful Asuka Langley Soryu's affection for yourself and left me in the dust!" the bully barked, more animal than human as his face contorted with loathing and jealousy. "You stole her love for yourself. You broke my heart. And now, I'm going to break something of yours. Starting with your friends."
"We haven't done anything to you. Please leave us in peace" Mari tried to order only to be hit full in the face by a vicious backhand blow which knocked her glasses from her eyes and sent her sprawling backwards to crash into a lemonade stand causing a puddle of lemonade to spill all over the asphalt as she cried out in pain and surprise.
"I'm alright" she called back.
"MARI!" Shinji cried in shock and anguish.
"Oh, you very much have wronged us." Another bully with brown hair in a ponytail said through clenched teeth. "And now it's time for all of you to pay the consequences. The sooner we get rid of you. The SOONER GENDO WILL MAKE US EVA PILOTS AND THE SOONER ASUKA WILL START NOTICING US INSTEAD OF YOU!"
He was shouting madly by the end of his rant as sweat trickled down his face and saliva out of his mouth.
Rei who had at first been cowering in terror as all her usual social awkwardness came back upon her, had managed to lift her hands away from her face as she heard Mari's scream as she managed to stop shaking.
Now taking a glance at Shinji's practically white face which looked as he was about to keel right over at any moment, caused an inner fire hotter than the sun to burn within her.
So, this was what her poor, misunderstood saviour and benefactor, had to deal with every day of his miserable life. So many insults but none of the context of all he and the other pilots had been through. And what he alone had to go through in addition…
Shivers had run down her spine when Shinji briefly remarked upon his daily troubles even outside of Asuka's influence, but seeing such atrocities unfold before her very eyes…
Rei had already snapped once today, spilling her guts out in a way she never thought possible.
But one more look at how Shinji's hopeless eyes were like dark tunnels and how Mari was visibly trembling as she struggled weakly to her feet, the Angel part of the half human, half Angel Rei was beginning to reawaken.
It wanted retribution, revenge and to raze the world itself in the name of all those dear to her. It lent the blue haired girl strength she never thought she could possess.
On some days she would curse moments like these and do everything in her power to restrain herself. Today she welcomed the momentary boost of power now coursing through her veins. She was an Angel. Shinji's guardian angel.
"It isn't just Asuka who can defend you from bullies, Shinji." Rei inwardly intoned as she courageously leapt in front of the incredulous Shinji as the larger of the two teenage bullies closed in upon him.
"Let him go. He's had enough already." Rei firmly told the bullies in the voice of a stern headmaster.
"Leave us alone or as the first child, I will have you all reported to the commander of NERV himself for assaulting a pilot and the consequences will be very harsh."
Rather than angry, the bully leader seemed amused by this entire affair which knocked the wind out of Shinji as he watched Rei stare down the three jerks twice her size, rubbing his eyes to make sure he was not dreaming this up.
Asuka's punches must have knocked him unconscious. This couldn't really be happening.
"You're standing up for a wimpy wimp like that? What's he to you? Look at him. He's probably runs away from his own shadow. Look at the wimpy ass way he's shaking right now. He'll probably never measure up to anything."
"He already measures up to more than what any of you can imagine. And I know it because I've been with him and I know him the way none of you do." Rei rebutted, forcing back guilty thoughts of the past several years since the first day she met Shinji.
"No" she whispered as an apparition of young Rei materialized out of thin air and stared at her tauntingly. "I'm different now. Shinji made me different. And I've changed. I regret what I did to Shinji and the others in the past, and I'm not going to repeat the same mistakes you made" The young Rei finally gave in and lowered her head as she vanished back into present Rei's memory, hopefully to stay dormant evermore just in time for the tall and thin dark haired giant to issue his next insult.
"You must be really retarded if you think he's worth protecting. The chief of NERV must have been on some sort of high when he picked you to be his favourite, eh Rei. Ha. Rei. What kind of stupid name is that? Your mother couldn't love you enough to be to bothered to come up with a proper name? Now why don't you just get out the way and we won't hurt you. Come on. Work with me here. It's only stupid Shinji that we want."
The words "stupid Shinji" caused steam to billow fiercely from Rei's ears in a gigantic plume, as she raised her own fists which she had until that moment kept at her sides in a vain attempt to reason with an unreasonable monster.
Shinji would never know why the next words that came out of her mouth were as calm and steady as her usual speech despite her evident fury at the three thugs she was daring to stand up against, all in his name. Rei really was a goddess.
"Don't be so proud of your cruel habit of making fun at the expense of others. The ability to be so uncaring and selfish to the selfless hero who risked his life countless times for you, is insignificant to the raw talent and courage that Shinji, and Shinji alone possesses having sacrificed so much for us all in his selfless crusade"
"Get in there Nami blue" Mari quietly cheered as she observed the confrontation with her own fists readied in case worst came to worst.
The bully laughed a little as his two lackeys struggled to keep a straight face over Rei's overzealous praises of Shinji.
"Don't try to frighten us with your sorcerous ways. Your sad devotion to that steaming pile of compost not worth the space he takes up on Earth, will not help you in the slightest when we smash your faces in."
And without further ado, the three large brutes charged at the three young pilots who had put themselves on the line countless times to protect their ungrateful attackers and their world.
Rei managed to elbow the ringleader in the chest and kick him in the shin, but this move left her back turned to the other two teenagers who quickly moved on to capitalize on her weakness…
Only for the brown haired one with the ponytail to be tackled to the ground by a very determined Shinji and the remaining red haired quiff to be smacked in the face by Mari who sprang forward with lightning speed upon sensing an opening, her agility reflecting none of the lingering pain her backside had sustained from her earlier fall.
With his much larger opponent firmly in his grasp, Shinji recklessly dived for the ground in a move he had seen Asuka pull off many times before that she called "a submission". From the cry of pain his victim made upon hitting the ground, he had inflicted quite a bit of damage, but this did not stop the two from engaging in a messy struggle in which both took turns being on top and beneath each other, getting battered all the while.
Mari and her redhead roughneck foe sustained multiple bruises as they fought, neither saying a word to the other as they let their fists and feet do the talking for them.
Rei fought valiantly but even with her enhanced strength and reflexes as a half Angel artificial human, she was eventually brought down with a wild knee to her stomach which she failed to dodge in time in spite of her best efforts.
She felt her wind being knocked from her as she fell face first to the hard rocky ground, sustaining a bleeding gash to her chin in the process.
The dark-haired leader bully stood over her smirking for a moment.
"Only human" he quipped unable to resist the temptation to make just one more bad pun before finishing the now defenceless bluenette.
It was then that a very powerful impact in his spinal region knocked him off balance and before he could register what was going on, his neck was clamped into a powerful vice grip which in his weakened state, he could not break from.
The air was very nearly squeezed from him when his ambusher turned him around still with his chin in the stranglehold to reveal the mild and innocent face of Kensuke, a close friend of Shinji's. "Dodge this." He answered, at least kind enough to finish the lead bully's sadistic one liner, before hitting him hard in the head, knocking him out cold. It was this ability to make light in even the darkest of situations that made him a closer friend to Shinji than a lot of the other EVA pilots.
Kensuke had charged in the direction of the scuffle the second he heard the sounds of fighting breaking out while Shinji's so-called other friend Toji chose to turn tail and run, excusing himself by saying that he needed to get home quickly to get some shuteye before tomorrow's work at NERV.
"Some friend you are" Kensuke had muttered under his breath as he pressed on regardless, arriving just in time to make a timely intervention without which Rei would surely have been fatally injured or even killed.
"Thanks Kensuke." Shinji gratefully exclaimed upon finally subduing his enemy with a rock he had managed to grab during their scuffle. "You're the best."
"Friends watch each other's backs, Shinji. And you are my true friend." Kensuke quickly replied as he ran towards the bully Mari was fighting and dealt with him in the same way he had dealt with the previous one.
"I can see why Shinji spoke highly of you." Mari coyly remarked as they exchanged friendly handshakes through their sweaty hands as she introduced herself to him. "Mari Makinami Illustrious. Fourth child and fourth pilot of NERV. It's an honour to finally make your acquaintance. Mr Kensuke Aida"
"The honour is mine" Kensuke quickly replied.
They helped a still conscious but very dizzy Rei to her feet before they dusted themselves off.
"Let's get out here." Mari suggested. "We can go to my house."
"I'd like that, but I have some NERV stuff at home I urgently need to be getting on with tonight" Kensuke apologetically said as he took a look at his watch.
"But I'll see you around Shinji. Take good care of yourself now."
He quickly took a look at the way Shinji's other friends now stood beside him. This boy was in good hands now and it made everything he had tried to do for Shinji worth it to see a smile which filled him with determination and hope.
"You all take good care of my friend Shinji too." He happily asked.
"We will." Rei answered as Kensuke took one last wave before heading in the other direction presumably towards his home.
Shinji, Rei and Mari waited until Kensuke's footsteps had died away before they turned to head to Mari's blue SUV. The festival had ended in the time it took them to ward off the bullies, but it didn't matter. As gruesome as it was and as sorry as they felt for their victims, that fight had brought the three of them closer together than ever.
In particular, Shinji and Rei were staring at each other with deep love filled eyes as they sat side by side in the back-row seats of the SUV as it drove off with a triumphant rev.
Rei had saved Shinji.
Shinji had saved Rei.
They had saved each other, and Mari and Kensuke had helped.
Life couldn't have been better.
…
In an deep underground room with smooth white floors and walls reinforced with plenty of sound proof tiles, a blonde-haired young woman was bent over a set of diagrams she had on a clipboard in her hands.
She checked and rechecked the diagrams in meticulous detail before taking another look at the large metal giant that a group of engineers and her fellow scientists from NERV were bent over, hammering and welding various parts into place.
A few questions to a few of them and a careful look at their progress herself later, the woman concluded that for now all progress was satisfactory as she sat on a nearby bench to take a little time to rest, having been stood up for the greater part of the day working and checking the progress of said work.
"It'll be finished soon ,Shinji" she said to herself as she looked at a photo she had on the wall to remind her and the other members of NERV she had managed to gather to her side of the main reason they were all here besides the salvation of the world. "Soon you really won't have to pilot an EVA ever again. And neither will your friends. I know you don't like piloting Shinji."
Said photo showed every single child pilot of NERV, for once in their life all smiling contentedly if only because they were attempting to look at least passable for a formal photograph they were posing for.
Most notably, Asuka's face in the picture had been smudged out with thick ink and Toji's had been crossed out with a single line.
Conveniently they were the ones sitting furthest away from Shinji and next to each other. Like two dastardly villains secretly plotting some nefarious scheme which could destroy a nation.
As the blonde haired chief scientist of NERV Ritsuko Akagi, better known as "Alphys" by some of her closer friends stared fixated at the seemingly harmless picture, tears blurred her vision until eventually salty water began to trickle from her usually serious eyes and she was forced to grab a handful of hankies from the large packet of hankies she now kept in her trouser pockets for such emergencies.
"I'm so sorry Shinji." She cried as she tried without success to compose herself through her tears which were completely uncharacteristic of the rational and resigned preacher of science and rationalism she was supposed to be. "I let Misato and Asuka beat you around for so long without doing anything, and it cost me everything."
She slapped herself hard in the face as the tears continued.
"My greatest failure Shinji is that I failed you. I should have been more careful, but I let my pride, my vanity, my drive for revenge against innocent people who didn't deserve any of my hatred get the better of me. I was so busy with my own selfish needs that I forgot about you, Shinji. I shouldn't have let Misato keep you Shinji."
Her sobs subsided a little after several repeat as she turned her attention to another photo she had on the wall of a younger Misato and her back in university. How the times had changed, and yet how little Misato had changed.
"I always hoped Misato would grow out of it." Ritsuko confessed as she turned her head to look up at the heavens as if to plea upon the mercy of god himself. "I was always trying to get her to change her attitude of laughing at the expense of others. But I guess I failed that too."
She clenched a fist at the younger Misato still in her school uniform. "I'm sorry Misato. Sorry I ever met you and Kaji. You're both backward hicks and immature sadists who never learned how to grow up and act your age."
She wiped a few of her tears away with a hanky before slapping herself once more. The guilt she now felt towards herself, was all consuming.
"I'm no priest either Misato. But at least now I'm trying to make things right. And until you try to make things right, I'm afraid we can't be friends anymore."
Her gaze drifted to a third picture. A picture that once represented the bane of her existence which now represented the purpose of her continued commitments and hard work in life.
The most important picture for the chief scientist of NERV to wake up at the crack of dawn every morning to quickly and diligently get to work on the forbidden projects that Gendo would surely have her killed for if he caught her in the act of performing them.
Ritsuko closed her eyes as more tears flooded out from her now very sore and red eyes regardless.
"Rei. I won't ask you to forgive me. You have a right to hate me for every atrocity I've committed over my miserable excuse of my life. But please. I ask of you just one favour. Just, a semblance of a favour. Let me help you this one time. Let me show you just this once that my intentions are noble and that I really do regret everything I've done to you. "
She walked down a flight of stairs to a room where several capsules were tidily positioned in two straight rows. In each liquid filled capsule, lay a clone of the blue haired first child of NERV, Rei Ayanami. At the back of the room, sat a gigantic machine whose vast array of screens, buttons, switches and wires would have made even the most complex devices officially part of NERV's laboratory look simple in comparison.
Ritsuko's back strained with pressure as she looked over her self-proclaimed greatest invention ever and remembered the sleepless nights she had spent perfecting every part of it down to the tiniest detail.
Every cog, gear, screw. Everything was proofread till her eyes cracked dry with exhaustion and she fell asleep, her head on the machine she spent all night working on.
She would turn up the following day in NERV barely able to remember her name or speak without a yawn as her eyes rolled open and shut uncontrollably.
But great crimes required even greater exertion to earn redemption.
"You are no longer in any danger Rei." Ritsuko fervently announced, knowing there was no one in the room but herself. "I've already fixed the clones of you that I nearly destroyed, and now I've finally finished the device that will finally restore all your memories that you lost."
She finally stopped crying completely as she wiped the tears from her eyes and cracked a tiny ghost of a grin.
"I know you like Rei, Shinji. And I know you like Shinji Rei. And when my plans have succeeded, you two will be able to be safely together away from the tyranny of NERV and the angels. This I promise."
And last of all, she ventured into another corner of the room where a table with a picture of a brown-haired woman in a white lab coat just hers stood silently judging her in an expression that was neither friendly nor friendly.
"Don't worry… mother. After the Evangelions are no longer needed to fight the Angels, I will find a way to bring you back as well, without destroying the world. Then you can apologize to Rei too."
She stood there in solemnity for a few moments, her hands clasped in prayer like she sometimes saw people do at church when she was little. She was not normally a religious person, but moments like these deserved an honest to goodness prayer even if she was only praying to a god that she didn't believe in.
"It isn't just you two who miss your mothers, Shinji and Asuka." She sarcastically but sympathetically remarked once she opened her eyes and stepped away from the makeshift shrine, taking care not to turn her back until she was out of the room. "We orphans should stick together."
In the room above her, the small but tireless legion of the few devoted followers Ritsuko "Alphys" had managed to gather through her sheer faith to her cause. were still hard at work building the giant metal robot only slightly smaller than an EVA, "the amalgamates" as some of the scientists working there preferred to call.
They were now in the process of adding a huge cannon on it's back which would give it a powerful ranged attack that even the most powerful EVA did not have, allowing it to fight at range while staying safely out of striking distance of the Angels and other foes alike that it was intended to combat.
On the reinforced grey metal chest plate of the nearly finished robot written in big bold white letters, were two words.
Two big and wonderful words that Shinji, Mari and Rei thought they'd never hear again since the awful incident in which their hopes of finally finding their hopes and dreams in freedom were dashed against the jagged rocks of despair and unluckiness as the last of the light in their eyes went dim, never to fully rekindle.
The two words: JET ALONE.
Not much really to say here. Just thank you all so much for reading and reviewing and being such epic and amazing people. Props to everyone who read to this far. No really guys. I thank you all.
I guess all I really can say is, you'd think by now NERV would start building something better to fight the Angels? It's clear the EVA's aren't doing the job well.