Author's Notes: Now, back by popular demand (well, actually by Pyro's demand, and believe you me, that guy can be demanding (-ouch- stoppit Pyro, that's a lead pipe) well, Pyro is popular (right?) so I guess it is by popular demand) where was I? Oh yes, back by Pyro's- I mean popular demand... ah forget it
Chapter 17 – Death By Molestation
The great white form of Lilith/Rei was curled up in slumber upon the cross-infested earth, her head resting on the precious black sphere that contained the blissfully ignorant souls of humanity. The grumbling forms of all the currently-present Angels languished beneath her resting form, trapped there by her now-prodigious bulk.
"Wait for Israfel, you said," Satchiel griped. Shamshel did not answer, but he knew his brother was nearby, since he had heard the pitifully muffled screaming up until about an hour ago. "Israfel will take care of everything." Pregnant pause. "You said." He heard an embarrassed grunt, but felt no sympathy whatsoever. "Then why the hell am I stuck beneath Miss Sta-Puft the Marshmallow Queen??!"
Meanwhile, Rei dreamed, and the rest of humanity dreamed right along with her.
Rei's Dream
Tokyo-3, the bustling transformable mega-city, was filled with life, and the color red. Beneath multiple layers of armored substrate was spread out the lush greenery of the Geofront, and beneath that were the hidden and multitudinous halls of NERV. Beneath THAT was a very large space that had been carved out by the power of a single mind, the owner of which sat in a throne pushed up against one of the walls of the massive cave-like room. Her small form was hidden by a light-blue flowing cape which hung from an overly flamboyant dark blue breast-plate-shoulder-pouldron combination. A slender gloved hand turned the page of the small booklet she was reading very intently. Closing the manga with a snap, her crimson gaze bored into the far wall as she brooded. Finally, her other hand reached out, carefully depressing a button set into the armrest of her throne.
Raucous music danced its way through Misato's apartment as the three observers danced the fine line between death-by-dismemberment and death-by-suppressed-laughter.
"Left arm blue!" Misato cackled, calculating the most difficult move possible for the struggling redhead. "Right-leg-yellow!!"
Asuka sweated, cursed, stole a look over at the duo to her left, and immediately lost her temper, then her balance.
"What the hell are you doing, you slut??" she screeched, as Fate seductively threaded an arm around Shinji's, placing her hand on a blue circle. Asuka collapsed into a tangle of limbs with Mayumi, who attempted to escape the enraged redhead.
"Winning," Fate cooed, her mouth next to Shinji's ear, causing the boy to blush and fall into a heap, dragging her down on top of him. "Why Shinji, I didn't know you felt that way," she purred, ever so slowly oozing her way off him.
"YAAAAAH!" A red blur impacted the seductress, and they both tumbled across the room into the wall with a crash.
"-th-th-thanks, I think," Shinji gasped.
"You're next, dummkoph!" she snarled, pausing momentarily to glance over at him, her hands wrapped around her opponent's throat.
"That's right!" Misato exclaimed. "Next pairings: Asuka/Shinji-and-Fate/Mayumi!"
At that moment, Hikari's cell-phone chirped. After looking at the caller-id, her face took on a truly manic expression that went unnoticed in the general chaos. She slipped out the door, and it was ten minutes before anyone even knew she was gone.
Rei sat on her throne, watching Hikari bounce around excitedly.
"All hail the great Ayanami!" she gleefully shouted, thrusting her fist into the air.
"This city is rotting," Rei intoned, trying to ignore the girl's antics.
"...yes!" Hikari agreed slavishly. "Yes! Exactly! It-"
"-is full of red," Rei continued, preparing her thoughts. "First..."
"Paint!"
"What?" Rei looked reproachfully at the girl who was supposed to be her utterly loyal and devoted servant.
"We'll pain over everything that is red!" She shouted gleefully. "All because you, oh wise Ayanami, have decided in your omnipotence-"
"Omniscience."
"-huh?"
"The correct word in that syntactic structure is 'omniscience,'" the wise Ayanami said by way of correction. "Although I am omnipotent as well."
"-oh. Then... oh wise Ayanami, you have decided in your omniscience, that..."
"Yes?" The wise Ayanami lifted a hand to a rope in preparation.
"-um, well, I forgot." Hikari pulled a piece of paper out of her pocket and tried to find her place in the lines.
"If you're looking for your line in the script, it's right before the splash," the wise Ayanami said helpfully, testing the tension on the rope.
"Hm, splash, splash..." Hikari looked down the page. "Oh! There it is." She cleared her throat. "All because you, oh wise Ayanami, have decided in your omniscience to rid this city of the color Red!"
Splash.
Rei had pulled on the rope, opening the trap door beneath Hikari.
"Just as I suspected," Rei murmured, looking down the hole sadly. "It's not funny now. All because you forgot your line. You're fired."
"-dammit!" the hole echoed with Hikari's expletive.
I hope the next prospect has a better memory, Rei thought, making her way back to her chair. And a better punch line.
The next prospect, oddly enough, was preparing to play a rather demented version of Twister with one Shinji Ikari.
"Prepare for a world of pain, Shinji!" Asuka exclaimed cracking her knuckles and doing a few warm-up stretches.
"-um, aren't we on the same team?" the boy muttered uncomfortably. Asuka was just winding up to rip him a new one when her phone began playing a rather syrupy rendition of 'Fly me to the moon.'
"Ah!" Asuka chortled. "Too bad she's not here to hear it..." She put the phone to her ear. "Ja?"
"You're up next," a very bored-sounding secretary droned out.
"Hey! What're you doing with the First's cell-phone?? Like I care..."
"I'm her booking agent," the tired voice proclaimed.
"Oh! You're Miss Whats-er-face calling about... that job." Asuka looked around discretely, as if she were hiding something. She put a hand over the mouthpiece of the phone. "Business!" she said sweetly, stepping out of the room. Misato looked at Shinji. Shinji looked uncomfortable. Fate looked relieved now that her primary rival had left the room. Mayumi looked hungrily towards Shinji.
"Well-I-gotta-go-see-what-Asuka's-up-to!Bye!" Misato bounced over to the door.
"Take me with you?" Shinji begged, looking fearfully at his two admirers.
"Sorry! It-might-be-dangerous..."
"More dangerous than leaving me here?" he asked desperately, but she had already gone and shut the door. The lock clicked ominously throughout the suddenly quiet room, and that was when Shinji noticed that this was one of those doors with a keyhole on both sides, meaning he was in deep pudu.
"Dammit," he muttered, jiggling the door handle ineffectually as Fate slunk up behind him.
Asuka looked over the script.
"So I'm supposed to play a hyper spazzoid girl who is your devoted slave?"
"Something like that," Rei answered. "But first you must dye your hair." She tossed Asuka a can of blue hair dye.
"What??" Asuka screeched in disgust, before catching herself. "I mean, why?" she asked in a sickeningly sweet voice.
"Because I cannot wage a war against the color Red with you like that," Rei explained.
Ten minutes and one thorough dye-job later, Asuka walked back before Rei, her hair purple.
"You know," Asuka wondered aloud, "if I play a spastic girl with my hair like this, won't I be mistaken for Misato?" Rei did not answer. Asuka clasped her hands and began bouncing up and down "-hehehe! Hehehehehe! I'm-a-lunatic-I'm-a-lunatic!" She stopped bouncing and crossed her arms with a smirk. Rei's eyebrow twitched. "What?" Asuka demanded. "What is it? Someone behind me?" She looked over her shoulder and saw Misato standing there. A dark aura emanated from the woman, but Asuka scoffed this off. "Seriously, why do you act like that?" she asked, turning to face her erstwhile guardian. "I wanna know!"
"Do-you?" Misato asked, her voice deepening daemonically. "It's a one way trip." Asuka backed up slightly, and Rei turned thoughtful at this exchange. She reached into her pocket and pulled out another bottle of hair dye, tossing it to Misato.
"I require a villain to obstruct my conquest, and you appear to be suitable for the job."
"-ooh-ooh-I-accept!"
Another dye job later, Misato bounced back into the room, her now-red hair bouncing with her.
"-hehe-look, I'm-Asuka!" She put her hands on her hips and began ordering an imaginary Shinji around. "Dummkoph-make-my-breakfast! Dummkoph-don't-forget-my-lunch! -hehehe!"
"Hey!" Asuka exclaimed, "I don't giggle like that!"
"Well-I-never-claimed-to-be-a-lunatic!" Misato yelled back. The two of them began a vociferous yet pointless argument as they left the cave to return to NERV proper, having forgotten all about Rei.
You just can't get good help these days, the omnipotent albino thought with a sigh.
Just as Misato and Asuka reached the lower levels of NERV, Matriel the not-so-itsy-bitsy spider attacked.
Alarms blared and Gendo ran through the halls in a panic. Spying the two women for which he was searching, his eyes lit up.
"You," he pointed at a red-haired Misato, "Go get dressed and prepare to fight the Angel." He turned to a purple-haired Asuka "You come with me. We've got to find my son..."
"Don't bother," Asuka said to herself. "He's probably half-dead by now..." and indeed he was.
Thus Misato found herself mistaken for Asuka and tossed into Unit-02's entry plug. Soon she was conversing with a ghostly Kyoko.
"Wait, you're not Asuka," Kyoko murmured, fingering Misato's faux-red hair. "What have you done with my Asuka?" Her eyes flashed when Misato just sat there vibrating and smiling happily. "Where's my Asuka??" The obstinate woman still did not answer, and so Kyoko ejected her plug, causing it to go pitch-black inside the enclosed chamber. This did not sit well with Misato, who recalled bad memories of Second Impact. She began screaming and pounding on the door of the entry plug. Her fury eventually grew to the point that she warped herself right out of reality. Or into it, depending on your point of view. She eventually kicked the entry plug door with sufficient force to send it into an arc through the air, where it landed with a splash in the distance.
Splash? Misato wondered, standing up in the plug. Her motion caused it to rock, and she looked over the edge to find she was in shallow red water, washed up on a beach. It was night, and in the distance, a massive white figure was curled up, her head resting on a massive obsidian sphere. Misato tromped through the water until she got to the beach, and her eyes were drawn by a sudden flash of light. Shinji sat up, wincing a bit, then noticed Misato. Panic crossed his face, then he remembered that Misato already knew about the resets.
"How'd-you-die?" she asked him.
"By molestation, of course!" he exclaimed, suddenly angry. "Why'd you have to leave like that?"
"-oops-sorry-hehehe!"
"...no you're not," Shinji said with a sigh. That was when he noticed the giant Rei sleeping peacefully in the distance.
"Huh," he said, scratching the back of his head. "That's new."