Disclaimer: Neon Genesis Evangelion is the creation of Anno and Gainax. I don't own it, make no claims to it, and am making no profit from the fan fiction. No infringement of copyright is intended. In other words, please don't sue.
Chapter Four
"Come on, people, move it!" Hikari shouted to the members of class 2-A. "We're in danger every second we're out here and not inside the shelter!"
Unfortunately for her, class 2-A was far from terrified by the sounds of the sirens and were casually filing toward the armored doors of the shelter. Indeed, most of them looked excited and pleased at the prospect of spending the second half of the school day down in the shelter, instead of in class. They were in no panicked rush to get down there.
"Geeze, is the class rep PMSing or something?" one of her classmates muttered to another.
"I heard that, Ichigo!" Hikari barked.
The student in question flushed. "Gomen!"
Hikari just rolled her eyes and kept urging her classmates to move faster. After what felt like an eternity but was really closer to about a half an hour, everyone was finally in the armored bunker, and Hikari was able to get down to her duty of counting heads.
"Everyone is here save for Ikari and Ayanami, Sensei," she reported to the teacher with a polite bow.
"Very good, Horaki-san," the Sensei replied.
Hikari's wasn't surprised at the elderly man's calm response to Ayanami's absence. Shinji had told her that Rei was an EVA pilot as well, which would certainly explain the enigmatic girl's injuries and frequent absences.
Shinji was surprisingly willing to tell her about EVA and NERV when she asked. Either NERV hadn't ordered him to keep his mouth shut on certain things or he simply didn't care about keeping their secrets.
Knowing how apathetic Shinji was at times, it could well be the latter. However, Hikari supposed it could be the former as well. Shinji claimed he didn't know what the Angels or even the EVA's really were, and she found it hard to believe that someone in his position would be kept in the dark about such things.
Regardless, he'd shared a lot of information with her. Now that she was finished with her duties, she could finally try and put it to use.
"Hello, Hikari-san!"
Hikari stopped short, snapping out of her thoughts and coming face-to-face with one of her classmates. "Hello, Yuki," she replied with a brittle smile.
Hikari Horaki did not like Yuki. The girl was either too lazy or too dim to get good marks in school, and she seemed to be under the impression that the class representative had the power to change her grades. Hikari had no idea where Yuki had gotten this notion from, but it meant she had to deal with the girl often trying to kiss up to her.
"That was some good work you did getting everyone down here, Hikari-san," Yuki said with an obvious lack of sincerity. "Honestly, I don't think these morons realize what a serious situation an Angel attack is."
"Thank you, but I'm really just trying to do my duties," Hikari said, hoping that would end it.
"But you're so dedicated, far more so than most of the class reps I've known!" Yuki said. "Why, you're so trustworthy that I'll bet Sensei would even let you double check his grades for him."
And there it is, Hikari thought disgustedly. When will she ever get a clue?
She was about to assure Yuki that Sensei had never once asked her to look over his records of everyone's grades for errors, when another person suddenly spoke up.
"Hey, class rep."
She turned to see Toji standing nearby, with Kensuke right beside him.
"What do you want, Suzuhara?" she demanded automatically.
"We both have to go to the bathroom," Toji replied.
Hikari narrowed her eyes in suspicion. "You were supposed to go before we got here," she said.
"It was a little difficult with you shouting at us to move faster," Toji pointed out.
Hikari sighed. "Fine," she said with a dismissive wave of her hand. "Go, just be quick about it."
"So, does Sensei ever ask you to double check our grades for him?" Yuki pressed before Hikari could use the disruption to escape.
The class rep sighed, unable to believe her bad luck.
"Target in the center, pull the switch," Shinji chanted his new mantra as Unit One rocketed toward the surface. "Target in the center, pull the switch…"
The high speed ride finally ended with an unpleasant jerk, good old inertia reminding him that piloting EVA didn't exempt him from the laws of physics. Shinji took a deep breath, as 'he' clutched onto the pallet rifle tightly.
One side of the faux building opened up, allowing Unit One to exit. The Angel, a dark purple, vaguely insectoid thing was towering over the city of Tokyo-3, several kilometers away from EVA.
Given the scale of the combatants, several kilometers really wasn't a large distance at all.
"Target in the center, pull the switch," Shinji mumbled to himself as he aligned the reticule over the Angel on his HUD. "Target in the center, pull the switch."
The display indicated a solid target lock, and Shinji squeezed the trigger of the pallet rifle, sending shells that were normally used by heavy tanks flying toward the Angel. He didn't stop firing until the distinctive click of the gun running out of ammunition filled the air. By this point, the Angel had disappeared into a thick, dark cloud.
"You idiot!" Misato shouted over the radio. "You let the Angel hide in your smoke!"
But I just did what you trained me to do! Shinji thought but didn't have the nerve to say. Oh god, please let it be dead.
A flash of pink light burst out of the cloud of gun smoke, and Shinji instinctively tried to dodge. Unfortunately, he was too unpracticed with EVA, his sync ratio still too low. Unit One went tumbling backwards, falling onto the street.
Yet he didn't exactly wish he'd hadn't tried an evasive maneuver, noting how the Angel's whip had cleanly sliced the building EVA had emerged from in two.
Okay, now what? I did the thing with the pallet rifle, and it's still alive, he thought, feeling his heart rate starting to accelerate rapidly.
The Angel lashed out again and Shinji, already firmly in the grip of panic, was barely able to force Unit One to scramble out of the way in time. He wasn't fast enough to save the umbilical cable, however, and the timer appeared inside the entry plug and began to tick downwards.
Before he could do anything else, before he could even realize just how disastrously unlike the training simulations he'd undergone this battle was, the Angel attacked a third time, wrapping one of its two pink whips around Unit One's leg. Shinji's own leg felt as though it had white hot barbed wired encircling it, and he screamed.
His screams only increased in volume when the Angel sent Unit One flying through the air with a flick of its glowing appendage.
Please tell me those two idiots didn't do what I think they did, Hikari silently pleaded to any deity that would listen as she rushed toward the exit to the shelter.
It had taken her several minutes to disengage from her conversation with Yuki, and Toji and Kensuke hadn't returned from the bathroom by then. It would have been a suspiciously long bathroom break for two girls, let alone two boys.
She hadn't encountered them as she rushed to the girl's bathroom to change, either. Now, having transformed and again donning the mantle of Spirit, Hikari just hoped they had gone back to wait with everyone else while she was changing.
Finding all the doors to the surface standing open except for the last one—exactly the way they had been when Toji had left the shelter last time—soundly dashed those hopes.
Quickly opening the last door, she flew out, ignoring the mammoth form of the Angel and the EVA flying through the sky as she scanned the hillside for the two boys.
Wait a minute…EVA flying through the air?
She looked up and saw that the huge war machine was indeed soaring through the sky, and judging by the way it was wildly flailing its limbs about, it was completely out of control. Hikari looked at the spot where she estimated it would land, and found herself unsurprised to see Toji and Kensuke standing there, apparently frozen in place by their fear.
Spirit sprang into action, her white wings beating furiously as she sped toward the two boys, ignoring the EVA's shadow as it fell upon her.
This is going to be close, she thought grimly, squinting against the rush of the wind as she tried to gain even more speed.
The Evangelion and winged girl both closed in on Toji and Kensuke. Had anyone been watching the potentially deadly race, they wouldn't have felt safe wagering which one would reach the two young men first.
Spirit proved herself able to fly just a little bit faster than EVA could fall. She grabbed each of the two boys by the collar of their shirts and kept going without slowing down, dragging them along with her, out of the danger zone. The EVA crashed onto the side of the hill a split second later, the entire world seeming to shake from the force of the impact.
Still holding the collar of one of her classmates in each hand, Hikari came to a stop, hovering easily in midair. She breathed a sigh of relief, then lifted Toji up so he was level with her.
"Well, hello again, handsome," she said with a smirk. "Fancy meeting you here."
He chuckled weakly, obviously still shaken by how close he'd come to getting crushed by EVA. "Hello, Spirit," he greeted. "Looks like you saved me again. Arigato. Uh, I see you've changed your costume."
She grinned. "Why, it's so nice of you to notice. Do you like it?" she asked coyly.
Toji just opened and closed his mouth dumbly, looking like he was in very serious danger of getting a massive nosebleed.
"Who the hell is that?" Misato demanded, looking at the image of three youths on the main screen in the NERV command center.
Two of the kids, the ones Unit One had nearly flattened into pancakes, looked like perfectly normal teenagers. The girl, though, looked like anything but normal with her great, feathery wings.
One of the smaller screens suddenly displayed the school ID's of the two boys. "Shinji-kun's classmates?" Misato frowned as she read them. "But what are they doing out there?"
"Never mind them," Vice Commander Fuyutski snapped. "Who or what is that girl?"
"That mask she's wearing is covering up too much for the MAGI to utilize facial recognition software," Aoba said. "We can't identity her."
"Sir!" Makoto said. "We're getting a red/blue pattern from that girl! It matches the one from the previous incidents exactly!"
"She's the anomaly?" Fuyutski demanded, incredulous.
"Yes, sir," Maya said. "All three MAGI are in agreement on that point."
Damn, she would have to finally show her face when Ikari's not here, Fuyutski thought.
"The Angel's approaching Unit One, sir," Makoto said, abruptly reminding everyone of their enemy.
"Shinji-kun!" Misato called. "You've got to get moving, Shinji-kun! The Angel's approaching!"
The Third Child was still recovering from his unscheduled flight over Tokyo-3, it seemed. Evangelion Unit One didn't move as the Angel drew near, and Shinji didn't report in. Misato felt bile threatening to rise up in her throat, knowing there was nothing she could do now to prevent her ward from meeting his ancestors far too soon.
The Angel lashed out with its energy whips, but Unit One finally sprang back into motion, reaching up and grabbing the deadly weapons before the Angel could slice through the EVA. Shinji screamed in pain, but apparently he was able to think through it enough to act. Unit One pulled the Angel toward itself, then flung the beast away. It went flying across the city like some kind of out of control parade balloon.
"The EVA's hands have sustained fifth degree burns!" Maya reported. "Part of the gauntlets have been completely disintegrated!"
"Damn," Misato swore. "Shinji-kun, withdraw! Head for recovery route—"
"Belay that!" Fuyutski barked. "Pilot Ikari, there is a building with a fresh umbilical three kilometers north of your position. Get Unit One back on external power and await further instructions."
"Uh, okay," Shinji said, getting Unit One back on its feet.
Spirit sighed slightly as she watched the EVA get up and start walking, moving conspicuously away from the Angel. She hadn't really expected that much from Shinji, but still…
"Well boys, not that it hasn't been a pleasure speaking with you, but it looks like I've got some work to do," she said to Toji and Kensuke.
She flew back down near to the entrance to the shelter and put her two impromptu passengers down on their feet. "Head back into the shelter you two. The professionals will take care of this one," she said, then turned to look Toji in the eyes with a grin. "Until next time."
Spirit blew him a kiss, invoking a furious blush from the Osaka boy. Giggling, she flew off, never noticing that Kensuke had surreptitiously kept his camera pointed at her almost the entire time.
"My god!" the shorter boy exclaimed as Spirit flew off. "She's real! She's really real!"
"I told you," Toji said smugly.
"And she's into you!" Kensuke said, clearly amazed and still overwhelmed. "Why didn't you tell me she was into you?!"
"I was afraid it would've made the story even less believable," Toji replied with a smirk.
With the two boys safe on the ground, Spirit turned her mind to the Angel, mentally running through everything Shinji had told her about them and the mechanics of AT fields. She visualized an impenetrable wall around her, and the air shimmered briefly as hers came to life.
It had the desired effect. The Angel immediately shifted course, ignoring the EVA and heading for the new threat. Spirit swallowed as it drew nearer, suddenly realizing just how huge the Angel really was. The giant purple cockroach might have looked almost comical under other circumstances, but with it right there, coming toward her, it was downright terrifying.
For a moment, she considered simply flying away and hoping that Shinji and EVA could handle the thing.
Then the moment passed and she steeled her courage, staring defiantly at the Angel as it approached. She could actually feel her AT field coming into contact with the Angel's as it drew near, the two meshing together and neutralizing one another. She couldn't see any of it, but she didn't have a doubt in her mind that it had happened.
The Angel lashed out with its glowing appendages, but Spirit was able to dodge without difficulty. She grinned, suddenly realizing this might not be as bad she had feared. The Angel was like someone trying to kill a fruit fly with a bullwhip. Sure, if it was able to hit her, she was done for, but it was never actually going to hit her. She was far too small and quick compared to the lumbering behemoth.
Still, that didn't mean she wanted to get any closer to the thing, but then how could she attack it?
The Angel struck again, and again Spirit dodged, flying up and to the left. The sudden change in position left her facing the mountain where she'd "practiced" using her wings several weeks ago, the crater and rather scorched trees still visible. She wondered if she could do that again, and tried to recall the feeling of power that had seized her before she'd accidentally blown a chunk out of the mountain.
A sphere of white light immediately formed in her palm. Spirit grinned and aimed carefully for the red sphere in the Angel's underbelly.
A white blast of energy shot out from her hand, sprouting two "arms" just before it connected with the Angel, making it look like a cross. Spirit's aim proved true, and it slammed right into the red core like a battering ram, sending the Angel flying backwards. The dark purple beast crashed into one of the mountains ringing the city, though not the same one Spirit had left her mark on, and collapsed.
"All right!" she cheered, pumping her fist triumphantly. "Spirit, you rule!"
The Angel stirred, immediately bringing an end to Spirit's little celebration. The monster slowly drew itself back up into its upright position, swaying slightly as though it were dazed before finally seeming to regain its composure. Its core was visibly cracked, with sparks shooting out of it furiously, but it was still alive.
You've got to be kidding me! I almost blew up a mountain with one of those blasts! Spirit thought incredulously.
The whips began to whirl and writhe in front of the Angel so quickly and so completely without pattern that even she couldn't hope to evade them if it got close. Judging by the way it was advancing on her, that was probably its plan.
"Eeep!" Spirit squeaked, beating her wings as she flew away from the Angel.
She fired another cross shaped blast of energy at it, but this time the Angel was ready for it and dodged, only getting grazed by the attack. If it even noticed that a bit of its side was blackened and scorched, it gave no notice.
Man, that thing can really move when it's pissed, Spirit thought.
BOOM!
She turned to see Unit One standing several kilometers away, holding an EVA scale missile launcher in both hands. An enormous missile, hopefully armed with a conventional rather than N2 warhead, was flying toward the Angel.
There's no way it could ever make it past those whips, Spirit thought. But…
Spirit stopped retreating from the Angel, hovering in midair. Fortunately, angry though it might have been, the Angel was still a good deal slower than she was and she had put considerable distance between herself and it.
The missile Unit One had fired drew close to the Angel, and it wrapped its two whips around the thing, neatly bringing its advance to a halt. Flames continued to erupt out of the back of the missile, but it just didn't have the thrust to break free of the Angel's grip. The Angel squeezed, its energy whips easily cutting through the missile's casing.
BOOM!!
The weapon erupted into a spectacular but useless orange and red fireball in the Angel's grasp, not damaging the energy whips in the slightest. With that annoyance taken care of, the Angel turned its attention but to the smaller but greater threat.
Only to find Spirit less than a kilometer away from it.
"Say goodnight," Spirit said, unleashing another blast of energy, right at the Angel's core.
The already damaged red sphere shattered under the force of the attack, and the blast of energy went right through the Angel, even as it flung it back. The monster landed just outside the city and collapsed again, this time for good.
"The target has gone completely silent!" Aoba reported from his place in the command center.
Everyone in the command center breathed a collective sigh of relief, even Vice Commander Fuyutski. They weren't exactly about to start celebrating, considering how little they had actually done against their foe, but they all happy to see the destruction of their species at the hands of the Angels averted once again.
"Well done, Shinji," Fuyutski said. "Now, I am designating the anomaly your next target. Apprehend her if possible, but do not allow her to escape."
The command center abruptly went silent, save for the omnipresent hum of the MAGI supercomputers.
"What?" Misato demanded.
"Wh-what?" Shinji stammered over the radio. "You mean the girl?"
"Yes, I mean the girl," Fuyutski said sternly.
There was a long pause from the Third Child. "But she helped me kill the Angel," he protested.
"The enemy of our enemies are not necessary our friend, Pilot Ikari," Fuyutski said. "That girl is an Angel, and an extreme threat. Apprehend her now. That is a direct order!"
"Commander," Makoto spoke up softly, "the anomaly's waveform pattern doesn't conform to the baseline set by the Third and Fourth Angels. We can't say for certain that she's an Angel, especially given her behavior."
The glare he received from the older man immediately made the bespectacled senior technician shut up.
"B-But…" Shinji stammered helplessly, obviously less than keen to turn on the girl that had helped him against the Angel.
"She's on the move," Aoba said. "Target is descending rapidly. All ground based camera have lost track her."
"Pilot Ikari! Obey my order!" Fuyutski barked.
Unit One didn't move.
"Target has reached ground level," Aoba said. "Sir, all aerial and satellite cameras have lost sight of her in the trees."
"We've lost all trace of the red/blue pattern, sir," Makoto added. "She's gone."
Fuyutski resisted the urge to pound the arm of the commander's chair with his fist. Ikari will have my ass for this, he thought.
"Recall EVA One," he ordered. "Captain Katsuragi, please see to the rest of this. I'm going to speak with Pilot Ikari personally. And someone contact the head of Section Two and tell him to expect me shortly."
"Yes, sir," Misato said obediently, even as she glared at the Vice Commander with naked suspicion.
I always wanted to see inside NERV headquarters, but this wasn't what I had in mind, Kensuke thought for what must've been the thousandth time in the past hour. This would be so cool if I wasn't a prisoner!
He was currently sitting inside a small room, being interrogated by a pair of Section Two agents. They had taken him and Toji into custody mere minutes after the alert was over and everyone got to leave the shelters.
The thing he might've found funny, had someone else been in his place, was that it was all being carried out exactly the way they showed it in the movies. He was illuminated by an overhead light, and everything outside the circle of light it cast was shrouded in darkness. He vaguely recalled learning somewhere that this was done to cause the subject of interrogation to suffer from sensory deprivation or something like that.
The Section Two agents were even doing the Good Cop, Bad Cop routine. Not that there was very much need for the Bad Cop; Kensuke wasn't about to let NERV do unspeakable things to him just to keep the piddling amount of knowledge he had about Spirit a secret. Besides, they'd already confiscated the tape from his camera, which undoubtedly would tell them far more than he ever could.
Really, the only secret young Aida had kept from them was that he'd made a copy of the tape and given it to a friend of his to hold for him, as insurance against this very situation.
And they hadn't even asked him if he'd done that.
"You're certain that you've told us everything?" Good Cop asked. "Please understand, Aida-san, if we discover that you lied or withheld information, there will be negative repercussions. None of us want that."
"Yes, I'm sure I've told you everything I know about the girl," Kensuke answered tiredly. "Can I get out of here now? Or at least, uh, get my phone call?"
Bad Cop snorted a laugh. "Kid, let me make something to you perfectly clear," he said, taking a quick drag off his cigarette and then pointedly flicking off some of the ash into Kensuke's lap. "You're not under arrest. NERV has taken you into custody under special order C-241, as authorized by the UN under the Emergency Wartime Provisions Act. What all that technical junk means is that you don't get no phone call, you don't get no trial, and you don't get to go home until we say so. Got it?"
Kensuke sighed. "Yeah, I got it."
"I'm glad you're so cooperative, Aida-san," Good Cop said. "Makes this easier for everyone. Now, why don't we go over what you know about this Spirit person again? Let's start from what your friend told you about seeing her during the First Battle of Tokyo-3."
"So, you believe he's telling the truth?" Fuyutski asked, looking into the room where Kensuke Aida sat through a one-way mirror.
Captain Chiron, the Chief of Section Two, smirked slightly. "I'm completely sure," he said. "He wasn't exactly the hardest nut to crack we've ever encountered. His friend was tougher, but not by that much."
"I see," Fuyutski said. "So, do their stories match?"
"Almost exactly," Chiron nodded. "The only discrepancy of any significance has to do with why Suzuhara was outside when the Third Angel attacked. Aida said his sister left the shelter and Suzuhara went after her. Suzuhara said he left because he wanted to have a look at the battle."
"Not exactly hard to figure out which of them is telling the truth on that issue," Fuyutski commented.
Chiron nodded. "You want me to have Suzuhara's sister brought in for questioning, too?"
Fuyutski considered it briefly, then quickly discarded the idea. Gendo would have done it, but he wasn't Gendo. Besides, he didn't see much of a point in professionally interrogating an eleven-year-old who probably couldn't tell them anything they didn't already know.
"No," he said, "the information we've gathered from the two boys should be sufficient."
"In that case, can I let them go?" Chiron asked. "I think we've gotten all we will from them. My men really just have the kids going in circles right now. And their fathers both work here. They'll start raising hell if their sons aren't released soon."
Fuyutski nodded. "I'll expect a report on your findings by the end of the day."
"You'll have it, sir," Chiron promised.
Hikari Horaki hummed as she walked to school the next day, feeling understandably pleased with herself over how everything had gone the other day. After all, how many teenagers destroy a massive threat to humanity and flirt with their crush in the same day?
"You're awfully happy," Nozomi noted suspiciously. "Something good happen yesterday?"
"What? I need a reason to be glad to be alive?" Hikari asked.
Nozomi rolled her eyes, then grinned wickedly. "You know, I didn't see you in the shelter yesterday," she commented. "I'll bet the reason you're so happy today is because you were in dark corner with a boy!"
Hikari sighed, but she was still feeling too buoyant to get truly annoyed. "Nozomi-chan, it's rude to make accusations like that," she said.
Nozomi just rolled her eyes, amazed that someone could be so obviously cheerful and yet not the least bit playful at the same time. "Fine, fine," she grumbled. "Whatever."
They reached school and parted ways as always, heading for their respective classrooms. Hikari sat down to wait for Sensei but soon got up when she saw Kensuke walk in. The otaku seemed cheerful enough, but there were dark bags under his eyes, as though he hadn't gotten enough sleep the previous night.
"Good morning, Aida," she greeted him. "Please forgive me for saying so, but you don't look so great."
He smiled ruefully. "I was at NERV until late last night, getting interrogated by guys in black suits," he said, as though telling her he was planning on going for a walk later.
She blinked. "What? Why?"
He grinned and opened his mouth, then snapped it closed, seeming to remember just who he was talking to. "Uh, promise you won't be mad, class rep?" he asked, rubbing the back of his neck nervously.
Hikari narrowed her eyes. "Aida…"
"Okay, okay," Kensuke said, putting his hands up in a placating gesture. "Well, I decided I just had to see EVA fight just once…"
Hikari listened to Kensuke for several minutes, "finding out" about Spirit and how she had saved the two boys and killed the Angel. Hikari did her best to act appropriately shocked as he told her about her alter ego, though she wasn't sure how good a job she did at it. She never had considered herself a great actress, but then again, Kensuke was so into telling his story that he probably wouldn't have noticed if she'd failed to bat an eye at it.
When he got to the part about NERV agents abducting him and Toji, however, Hikari didn't have to fake her surprise any longer.
"They spent six hours interrogating you and Suzuhara about this Spirit girl?" Hikari asked. "But why?"
Kensuke shrugged. "No idea. I wasn't the one asking the questions there. Bad Cop was very clear on that point."
"Bad Cop?" she asked.
"Uh, never mind," Kensuke said sheepishly, waving a hand dismissively. "Anyway, when they finally let me and Toji go, it was already night. Had to stay up real late just to get my homework done. So, what do you think about that, class rep?"
"I think that if I ever hear about you sneaking out of the shelter again, I'll have you on cleanup duty for the rest of the year," Hikari said. "And you can tell Suzuhara that goes for him, too."
Kensuke nodded vigorously, relieved to have gotten off with a warning. Hikari went back to her seat, trying to stifle the feeling of slowly growing dread rising up in her stomach.
It's no surprise that NERV would be really curious when a girl in a costume shows up and projects an AT field, she thought, trying to rationalize what Kensuke had told her. After all, Shinji said that only Evangelions and Angels are supposed to be able to do that.
She almost succeeded in convincing herself there was no reason to be worried, but then Shinji failed to make it to class. Hikari told herself that didn't necessarily mean anything, but she now had very little doubt that something was wrong.
Author's notes: Another chapter down, and Spirit has gotten her first kill, albeit with some help from one of the most depressed giant mecha pilots in all of anime. I really wanted Gendo here to be the bad guy, but he wasn't in Tokyo-3 during the episode that the Fourth Angel appeared in. My hands were more or less tied as a result, and I had to make Fuyutski the surrogate Bastard King for the chapter. Gendo will be back next chapter, and will kick the evilness up several notches, to no one's surprise, I'm sure.
Kaworu-kun, thanks for the advice about the Japanese. I'll try and keep it in mind.
Orionpax, great minds think alike, I guess. :P I'm glad I've captured your interest.
Kenzie, I'm glad you're enjoying the story so far. Shinji won't be chumming it up with Toji and Kensuke any time soon, though. As you can see, Hikari has inadvertently prevented a lot of the things that led to them being pals in the first place. I would like to make them friends, but I'm not sure if I can do it without it feeling like I've forced it.
As always, thanks to everyone who reviewed this fic.