Switching Places/Eva!
by Greylle and Kender_Sci
DISCLAIMER: Original series belong to someone else.
Chapter 21: Is this gonna be a bughunt?
The mass of wriggling tentacles moved closer, hovering at roughly power-line level.
Ranma moved forward and took a stance in the middle of its path. "Yo. You ain't getting any closer."
The tentacles shifted, revealing that there was actually a center of mass. In that mass opened a single eye.
It screamed and abruptly reversed course and accelerated.
"Huh?" said Ranma, echoed by most of NERV, the JSDF, Asuka, and various others observing this confrontation.
"Damnit, Ranma," said Ritsuko over the radio. "Why is it that nothing can go as planned around you?"
"It took one look at him, screamed, and ran away?" asked Makoto. "Why him and none of the people who it affected earlier?"
"Maybe it's a lover and not a fighter?" suggested Shigeru.
"Uh oh, it's going over one of the shelters!" called out Maya.
"Don't worry, those shelters have full environmental enclosure," said Ritsuko. "At least the thing is fairly slow."
The JSDF's little robot truck tried to keep up with the target, but they had to stop at intersections and eventually collided with an illegally parked car.
At which point the kaiju pointed several tentacles behind it and started firing off streams.
"It's increasing its speed?" asked Ranma, trying to line up a shot.
"Jet propelled, both clever and disgusting," said Asuka. "Send up the sniper rifle!"
"I already have it," said Rei, Unit 00 trying to get a bead on the racing Angel/kaiju.
Her rifle fired. The kaiju screamed and changed direction.
"Uhm, you missed," said Asuka.
"The kaiju appears to be trying to avoid direct confrontation," noted Rei.
"And it's running away too fast for us to catch 'em when we're using extension cords," noted Ranma. "Do we have any idea why it's running away?"
"Not so mindless, is it?" asked Makoto, bringing up details of the tentacle monster.
"Maybe, the 'fight or flight' instinct is pretty basic," countered Ritsuko.
"If it knows it can't beat Ranma, and is running away because of that, then it isn't mindless," said Makoto.
"That would indicate it has a sense of self," said Maya. "The ones who did that surrendered or tried to come up with a way of adapting to our presence peacefully."
"So far," indicated Ritsuko.
"Right," said Maya. "But... I'm going to recommend we just shoot that thing."
"Because a hentai tentacle monster is going to be a hard one to fit into normal society?" asked Makoto.
"Is this the Angels trying to give us the Human Instrumentality that we have been working for?" asked floating monolith #6.
"This is not the definition of 'becoming one' that we had in mind," drily reminded #7.
"They couldn't be altering the data to mess with us, could they?" asked #3.
"Impossible," said Keele. "Our spies have spies. Someone would have noticed if our network were compromised."
Ranma spoke up finally. "You know. The extension cords and batteries thing? It really sucks wind if the enemy doesn't come right to you."
"We noticed," said Asuka.
"Have you thought about air-lifting extra batteries every so far to maybe extend the range a bit?" asked Ranma.
"Which would leave us trying to swap out batteries in a fight," pointed out Asuka.
"That would not be an optimal situation," agreed Rei.
The radio clicked and Misato's voice came on. "The kaiju is apparently trying to go around your position, get on the elevator platforms and we'll move you back here - and then to a position in its approach path."
"I dunno," said Ranma as he trudged towards the elevator. "When that thing does that jet thing, it can move pretty fast."
Misato's image appeared on one of the displays. "Can't be helped. Five minutes of power and facing it with progressive knives, or more time and better weapons on your power cables. It's just one of those things that-"
"The kaiju is jetting!" said Makoto's voice.
"Angel!" Ritsuko corrected automatically.
"It's a tentacle monster! Ain't no description of any angel I've ever heard of." Makoto again.
"Can we just get going already?" complained Asuka as Unit 02 settled into the elevator. Some muttering in German followed that.
"Ah, the tsundere rushes to face the tentacle monster," said Rei softly from her position in Unit 00. "A classic situation. Will she get what she needs in the end?"
"Would you get OFF that damn website?" asked Asuka. "Or I'll give you a boot in your end!"
"You do realize that was a classic tsundere response, right?" asked Shigeru's voice over the line.
More muttering in German followed.
Ranma was actually glad when the elevator briefly cut off radio contact.
It took a few minutes, but here they were, standing in identical positions as the kaiju/angel/hentai tentacle monster floated there in midair.
"Okay, Third Child," said Asuka, striding forward. "Watch and learn."
Tentacles extended out, stretching to at least four times their previous length and drawing a startled squawk from Asuka. They grabbed her legs, wrapping around them.
WHAM!
Asuka realized she was on her back with tentacles still wrapped around her legs. "What the ?!"
"Hey, that almost looked like an aikido throw," said Ranma brightly.
"If an octopus could know aikido," put in Rei.
WHAM!
"I don't think I've run into one of those yet," mused Ranma. It certainly didn't sound that impossible to him. Probably be the Combat Pet of a Sea-Based Improbable Martial Arts style.
WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM!
"Someone just shoot the damn thing!" indicated Asuka after being repeatedly slammed into the street.
Ritsuko's voice was curious. "It seems to be able to change the length and rigidity of its tentacles."
"I noticed," said Asuka, noting that her Eva-sized shotgun had gone flipping away from her and hitting the release for her progressive knife as a result.
One tentacle sprayed a bunch of gunk all over her Eva's head.
"Oh great, now I can't see," said Asuka.
"Relaying external cameras to your display," said Makoto.
"Payback time!" said Asuka, twisting and stabbing at the tentacles on her legs.
Sandalphon screamed again and released her Eva, obviously preparing to flee.
Rei began shooting. Tentacles blocked most of the shots.
"Stupid, hentai, damn, thing. DIE!" called out Asuka, causing her Eva to roll to its feet and lunging forward with the knife.
The knife shot forward, backed by the full power of the outraged tsundere. Make that the 'full power of the Evangelion fighting machine'.
A tentacle blocked. The knife penetrated about one-quarter of its length.
Another scream was heard from the kaiju, this one of even higher pitch. Other tentacles shot out to wrap around limbs and pull the struggling Evangelion away from itself.
"I have a clear shot," announced Rei, firing the sniper rifle.
She really hadn't expected the tentacle-monster to use Asuka's Evangelion to block.
"STOP SHOOTING ME!" yelled Asuka, as Rei continued to try and fire around Unit-02 and the kaiju continued to wildly move around that Eva to try and block the shots.
"I am attempting to hit the kaiju," said Rei.
"ANGEL!" insisted Ritsuko over the radio.
During one of those high-speed moves, Asuka's progressive knife flew briefly free before bisecting an illegally parked SUV on the street.
"ARGH!" yelled Asuka, lashing around. "RANMA IKARI!"
"Yeah?" asked Ranma. "If you're gonna ask me to take a shot, I don't know how to do that when it's moving you around like that."
"Just get on the side opposite from Wonder Girl and pull out your sword. Cut the tentacles holding onto me, preferably before I get sick."
Ranma flinched. It was like when Akane used that calm reasonable tone that she had passed beyond rage and gone into something truly apocalyptic that she was at her most angry. "Okay."
Vshmmmm went a chi/AT-field blade being formed.
Nobody expected the tentacle-monster to hurl Unit-02 at Unit-01, though in retrospect it seemed fairly obvious.
The two went down with Unit-01 trying to catch Unit-02 and Unit-02 flailing around wildly.
Rei wasn't paying attention, as the tentacle-creature was now heading for her and she had a clear field of fire. She put three shots in it before it had closed to grapple with her.
"This is embarassing," said Fuyutsuki as the two Eva units on the ground started sliding around in the blood and goo that the kaiju had sprayed around. One would try to get up, only to lose balance and collide with the second. Or one would partially get up, the other would try to brace on the first, and both went down.
"Interesting that the goo viscosity seems to exhibit both stickiness and slipperiness," noted Ritsuko as she tried to get readings.
"Depends on the material it bonds to, I guess," offered Makoto. "The Eva armor seems to be 'sticky' while the pavement seems to be 'slippery'?"
"Hmmm," said Ritsuko, leaning close, her breasts bouncing into the back of Maya's head as she looked over her subordinate's shoulder. "Maya, increase the resolution on camera THX-1138 there."
Maya froze.
"Maya?" asked Ritsuko.
"Here," said Makoto, reaching over and adjusting a control. "There."
"That's it," noted Ritsuko, fascinated. "It looks as if the goo soaks into the substances it comes into contact with and alters their surface qualities. Fascinating."
"It'll make cleaning up after this fight troublesome," said Shigeru.
"No doubt," agreed Makoto. "You recovered yet, Lieutenant Ibiki?"
"O-of course," agreed Maya, adjusting a camera angle.
Asuka finally got her feet under her and lunged again, this time grabbing some downed power lines and bringing them around.
WHIP-CRAK!
"This is a concerning development," said Rei in her usual tone of voice.
"Stay there and take your punishment!" yelled Asuka, whipping the high-tension cables back and forth on the target.
"I'm ducking and covering," seconded Ranma as he stayed as far away as he could from the flailing around that Asuka was doing. Yeah, she was hitting the kaiju, but she was also hitting buildings and anything else nearby.
The kaiju went down, welts and cuts appearing everywhere on it as the assault went on.
Asuka only broke off the assault in order to stomp down on the kaiju a few times.
There was a great deal of staring in the NERV bridge area.
"Man, she is SUCH a tsundere," said Misato. "I never realized."
"Next time someone calls her 'Princess Asuka' I'm going to have trouble keeping from thinking about this interpretation of that nickname," said Shigeru.
"She's dominating the Angel," noted Ritsuko, twitching.
"All she needs is to have high heels on her Eva," said Shigeru.
"Oh thank you!" said Makoto, sitting back and rubbing his eyes. "I SO did not need that image. Someone pass the Brain Bleach."
It finally ended, Evangelion Unit-02 standing there with the impromptu whip in one hand. In front of it, cringing in place, was a thoroughly trashed Sandalphon.
"Is it over?" asked Ranma Ikari, peeking around a building.
Sandalphon abruptly burst into thousands of gallons of what looked like Kool-Aid.
"Okay, I am thoroughly freaked out," said Rei in her usual tone of voice.
"How can anyone tell?" asked Ranma.
"You see, Third Child?" declared Asuka, causing her Evangelion to take a proud stance. "That is how you should fight. Clean and elegant!"
"Uhm," said Ranma, looking around at all the chunks of building littering the streets, the damaged cars, the small flood of liquid whatever, chunks of Sandalphon that hadn't dissolved, and the exploding electrical substation in the distance. "Right. Clean and elegant."
"What the heck?" said Maya. "There was a flicker of AT field AFTER the Angel was killed. What could that mean?"
"Nothing good, I'm sure," said Makoto.
"Why did I just get a sudden chill?" asked Ritsuko.
"What the heck?" asked Ranma in Unit-01, the Eva picking up a leg to check the bottom of the foot. "What did I just step in?"
There was a single shot.
"Got it," said Rei. "There was a mini-Sandalphon."
"A mini?" asked Asuka, her Evangelion reacting to her emotional state by adopting a "shocked" pose.
Ranma started looking around, then stopped. "Guys. There's a buncha little trails going off towards a manhole cover. Which is open."
"Oh hell," said Asuka, summing it up.
"So, like Asuka's panty barrage," said Ritsuko several hours later at the debrief.
"You have no idea how much I hate that term," said Asuka.
"These mini-Sandalphon, nicknamed Sandies, are vulnerable to conventional weapons," said Ritsuko. "Unlike humans though, they lack vulnerabilities to the sorts of gas attacks or poisons we could introduce into their environment."
"'Sandies'?" asked Asuka. "Isn't that a girl scout cookie?"
"We thought about calling them 'Phonies' or chibi-Sandolphons, or just tentacle beasts," said Ritsuko. "We ended up using Sandies for now."
"So we can just shoot them with regular guns?" asked Asuka.
"I don't think you'll be needed," said Ritsuko. "Normal troops and security forces can bring them down and there's only a few dozen estimated to have escaped into the sewers. They're not going to be a problem."
"Yuck," said one of the Sandies as it got out of the sewer.
"You said it."
"Damn straight."
"I need a freaking shower."
The little (about the size of a large dog) tentacle monsters came out of the sewer grating in a manner which left their lack of a endoskeleton patently obvious.
"What do we do now though?"
"We shall find the Queen and give worship to her."
"All praise the Queen."
"I dunno. I think it'll be too nasty around here. Maybe there's a better place."
The slabs were meant to be a sort of shout-out to the monoliths in the old movie "2001" and related novels. Sort of. The actual given reason was to conceal identities but everyone there knew who everyone else was, and their virtual meetings were scrambled through several different programs and reoriginated to prevent tracking and had sets of firewalls both hardware and software initiated.
So they were paranoid, but when you are one of the highest ranks of an inner circle of a world-dominating secret society - paranoia was just one of the requirements for the position.
Still, in any such group, there were weird ones. Lorenz Keele was half-cyborg, linked to bulky devices that kept him alive long after he should have died. One of the others had entirely female staff at his private villa, with a host of mind-control devices and techniques to keep them loyal.
Most of those virtually present though had turned the volume to "mute" by this point.
"-and how does this remain ANYTHING like the Dead Sea Scrolls prophesized? The closest we're seeing to a prophesy in all this has been from a mangaka just prior to Second Impact!"
Most of these upper members of the secret society that controlled SEELE had learned to roll with changing situations. Most of them were managing. Most of them.
"What exactly does this secretion do, anyway?"
"The most potent aphrodisiac and stimulant ever seen."
There was silence among the various monoliths briefly.
"Do the little Sandalphon also produce this substance?"
"We'd have to capture one to be able to tell."
Another silence among the monoliths passed, this one a bit longer.
"You know, if NERV successfully puts this out on the market, they might not be able to completely supply their own budget - but it would go a considerable way to self-sufficiency."
Keele frowned at the monolith. "We don't WANT Gendo being self-sufficient."
"I wonder if I could get some of that substance. I'm sure it has some interesting chemical properties."
Keele frowned at the other monolith now.
"Purely scientific interest, you understand."
"What are the Ree doing?" asked a JSDF senior consultant.
"Power Armor, bug hunt," said a scientist, not looking up from making notes.
"Power armor?" the consultant asked then looked closer. "Is that an extendable chainsaw?"
"Yes," said the scientist.
"Does this have anything to do with the mini-Sandalphon running around?" asked the consultant.
"Yes," said the scientist, actually looking up this time. "Your point?"
"None of them have been seen anywhere near here," said the consultant.
"The Ree have stated that they want to be ready if one DOES show up here," said the scientist, going back to his note taking.
"Makes sense," admitted the consultant. "You're copying their designs?"
"Listing their anti-tentacle-monster suits as experimental prototypes, using the saner parts of the designs for eventual design of something more useful," said the scientist.
"Ah," said the consultant, wondering briefly how he was going to leak this to Doctor Akagi without having things point back to him. Tricky.
Asuka yawned and stretched as she woke up, eventually rolling out of bed and doing a few warm-up exercises as part of the morning routine.
From there she continued her morning routine: getting her toothbrush, squeezing a bit of toothpaste onto it, mumbling something vaguely resembling a "good morning" towards Ranma as he cooked something for breakfast, ignoring the penguin trying to get her attention as she headed for the front door.
Her attention wandered briefly as she noted the break in routine. Why was Pen-pen trying to get her attention? She wasn't naked again, was she?
Blearily she checked, fingers encountering clothing as she covered the motion by acting like she was just scratching an itch. Nope, she was dressed this time.
Asuka opened the door, stepping out onto the landing and brushing her teeth in the fresh morning air where she could do a few stretches and finish waking up.
"All hail the great Queen!"
"Queen Asuka!"
"You honor us with your presence, O Queen of Pain and Pleasure!"
Asuka Langley Soryuu blinked, pausing in mid-brush, then looked down.
There was a small crowd of tentacle monsters, all making moaning noises as they prostrated themselves before her. At least she thought that's what they were doing. They didn't have heads or anything but that was the general impression she was getting.
Asuka silently pivoted, walked back through the door, then considered what she had just seen as she closed the door behind her.
"Wark!" indicated Pen-Pen.
"Yeah, you did try to warn me," said Asuka. "Well... There's only one thing to do in a case like this."
"Wark?"
"No, not get you some sardines," indicated Asuka.
"Wark?"
"No, not go back to bed. Tempting as that thought is," indicated Asuka.
"Wark?" asked the penguin, who hadn't been asking anything of the sort but was willing to play along.
"Yes," said Asuka. "I believe that is the correct option for dealing with this sort of situation."
"What's that?" asked Ranma, producing a stack of pancakes.
Asuka stated everything in a calm, rational, manner. "Scream, go back outside, and proceed to stomp on the little things and kick them over the railing."
"That might encourage them," pointed out Ranma.
"I'll take that chance," said Asuka, who then went back outside.
"All hail the Tsundere Princess!"
"All hail Queen Asuka!"
"All hail - OUCH!"
"OW! OW! OW!"
"AIEEEEEE!"
Ranma set another stack of pancakes out on the table. "Just be glad she's got a target to take it out on."
"Wark," agreed Pen-pen.
Fuyutsuki didn't say a thing as he got onto the elevator.
Gendo Ikari remained completely impassive as far as anyone could tell.
It was well over a minute of floors ticking by before Fuyutsuki at last spoke. "I heard that one of the Council had a breakdown yesterday."
Gendo grunted softly.
"Had to be replaced with a junior member," said Fuyutsuki, shaking his head slightly.
"Tragic," finally commented Gendo.
"Something about how the predicted scenario has collapsed," said Fuyutsuki, still sounding as if he truly thought this was all a sad event. "Apparently, if one deviates from their established script - some cannot actually handle it."
Gendo cocked his head to the side, wondering if he should authorize Christmas bonuses. If it caused any more of the old men to keel over, especially Keele, then that might well be worth it.
"Another one might recover, but apparently this was caused by the use of Sandie Syrup."
Gendo raised an eyebrow and frowned slightly.
"Yes, apparently someone managed to procure a sample of the Sandalphon excretion and smuggle it to them. Not unexpected really."
"My heart, it weeps," said Gendo, his voice completely devoid of sympathy.
"I thought it might," said Fuyutsuki as the elevator dinged and the doors opened.
As the doors closed behind Fuyutsuki, Gendo Ikari allowed the barest hint of a smirk to show.
"They're gone."
"Good. Now we can infiltrate their domicile and hide in the Glorious One's bedroom."
"All hail Queen Asuka."
Thus having reassured themselves, the crowd of Hentai Tentacle Monsters checked the door.
"Locked?"
"I thought the Japanese didn't lock their doors."
"Dummy, that was before Second Impact. WAY before Second Impact."
"Now what?"
"We don't have bones, can we slip through the cracks?" Doink! Doink! Doink!
"We're not jelly monsters, you know." Not to mention what trying to fit a tentacle through a door crack looked like.
"Maybe if I grab the doorknob here, stretch to grab the hinge there, and then contract?" Pop!
"How'd you know how to do that?"
"When we got kicked off the landing the gal in 2B was watching some old 'cops and robbers' show on her television."
"2B?"
"I think it was 2B."
"2B or not-2B, that is the question!"
"No, the question is - door's open. What are we waiting for?"
"BANZAI!" called out the crowd of Hentai Tentacle Monsters, charging.
A swirl of snowflakes (actually potato flakes) and suddenly there was an obstacle.
Pen-Pen glared at the intruders, blocking them.
"It is only one mutated penguin!" declared one of the HTM as it rushed forward.
KA-WHAM!
One of the HTM who had remained in place corrected his fellow. "It is only one mutated penguin with a meat tenderizer that he's using as a blunt trauma weapon."
"WARK!" indicated Pen-Pen.
"He can't get all of us! Rush him!" indicated one of the HTM.
WHAM WHAM WHAMMITY WHAM!
"Retreat!" called out an HTM. "He is a formidable opponent."
"No frakking kidding," groaned out a flattened HTM.
"WARK!" indicated Pen-Pen as the HTM retreated.
"We shall return!" promised one of the HTM at the threshold.
"WARK!" indicated Pen-Pen, holding up a potato peeler that glistened evilly in the overhead lights.
"Urk!" indicated the HTM, leaving with all due haste.
Pen-Pen got out his little happiko that he wore for local matsuri and tied a headband into place. Looked like he had his work cut out for him today.
"So bored..." mumbled Ranma.
"-the general worldwide crop yields were down by 89% in the year immediately following Second Impact, leading to the Food Riots and the Pan-Asian Conflict-"
"Gott in himmel," muttered Asuka at her desk. "How does he manage to make this so boring?"
Kensuke Aida simply watched an episode of the post-Impact Gundam series Gundam X-R.
"-with one disaster directly causing another. Doctor Ian Malcolm would have been quite vindicated, had he not been killed while on the Pirates Of The Caribbean ride in Disneyland. Pity that. A fine Chaos theorist, lost in the chaos. He would have appreciated that. Oh yes. In any case, with the collapse of the Middle Eastern governments, themselves predicated by the food shortages, fuel shortages became widespread. The Pan-Asian Conflict escalated with the use of poison gas and biological agents. Meanwhile, in Russia-"
"He'll never suspect... the window!" said an HTM, throwing the window open.
WHACK!
"Oh yeah, 'never suspect the window'," said one of the other HTM. "Right. Ever heard of 'too obvious'?"
"You got any better ideas?" asked the HTM as it tried to remove a potato peeler from where it had impaled it.
"Actually yes," said the second HTM. "Doesn't that hurt?"
"Actually, yes," said the skewered HTM.
"-which reminds me of the bar I was at when Second Impact actually hit. We thought we were being attacked by zombies at one point, but it just turned out to be a sarariman who'd pulled a two-day stint. We were nervous back then, the ionosphere was right cocked up and cable out. Nobody had any clue as to what was going on. Japan back then it was illegal to even touch a firearm. So if someone got hit a few times with a frozen garlic pizza, who can blame anyone?"
"Unless you're a superhuman ninja like Ikari there," grumbled Toji.
Ranma shrugged. When the kid was right, he was right. He startled then as he thought of something. Maybe... "Oh, teacher. My super eye thingie sees a ca- I mean person stuck in a tree. I gotta go save it! Him! Them!"
"Huh?" asked the teacher, shuffling around and finding a log was sitting at Ranma Ikari's desk. "Oh. I suppose saving lives and such is part of your duties I suppose." Probably a secret ninja mission. Reminds me of my first wife, she was always sneaking off and doing who knows what.
"Oh my kami!" practically squealed Kensuke Aida, pointing at the log now sitting at Ranma's desk. "That was the log substitution jutsu! I've seen it on TV a million times!"
Toji considered his former best friend, who now looked like a bustier and somewhat more exotic lookalike of that growling Germanic girl over there. "Ninja."
"How dare he sneak off during class?" grumbled Asuka.
[Rei: You mean 'Why didn't I think of that?'] appeared on Asuka's computer.
[Asuka: I just think that as the oh-so-precious Commander's Son, he should be setting a higher example.] Asuka smirked back at Rei as soon as she hit the "Send" button.
[Toji: Ninja.]
[Kensuke: Asuka, did you just hit 'send all' on purpose?]
[Hikari: I have to agree with Toji on this one. Ninja.]
[Meiko: You mean I can't stare at Ikari-san's butt all day?]
[Kensuke: Uhm, did Rei just glow briefly?]
[Hikari: Trick of the light. Right, Ayanami?]
[Rei: I am experiencing a feeling I have previously not experienced. How curious.]
[Kensuke: Judging from the malevolent red glow - I'm going to say jealousy.]
"Ahem," said the teacher at all the sudden flurry of typing. "I'm glad you're all enjoying the lecture. Hmmm. Anyway. There I was when the flood waters rose, stuck in a bar with twelve exotic dancers, a fully stocked bar, a trained chimp, and no way to know the world wasn't ending. Power out. No signal on the cellphone. Sirens and explosions in the distance. Couldn't go anywhere and it seemed the world was ending all around us."
Dead silence in the classroom. Open staring was going on.
"But I'm sure you don't want to hear that," hastened the teacher. "We should just stick to the lesson plan - which involves the breakdown of the OPEC nations and their reorganization in the three years after Impact."
"Uhm, no," said Kensuke. "I'm sure we'd all benefit from hearing the details of how you survived all that."
"What he, I mean 'she' said," said Toji.
"Oh?" said the teacher. "Well, I suppose it might help. The first thing we did was-"
"Nebukawa No Sensei" was what he was mainly called. Nebukawa being an area of Odawara, which was itself in Kanagawa prefecture, roughly 90 km from Central Tokyo.
When Second Impact hit, Odawara had roughly 190,000 people living there. One week later, the number had been reduced to 37 and much of the area was underwater.
Floods and landslides had wiped much of the area out within the first day.
Mostly he just went with the name Nebukawa. As far as he knew he was the only survivor from that area now, so it was a rememberance of all those he'd known who were no longer here.
"The place was known as the Garter Belted," said Nebukawa. "A bar but also a place where business could be done of a less than open nature."
"Yakuza?" asked Kensuke Aida.
"Something like that," sighed Nebukawa. "There were exotic dancers, some gaijin tarento in fact. Ah Monique -"
Everyone listened for a few moments but the teacher seemed to be lost in old memories. Finally Hikari cleared her throat.
"Hmmm. Oh yes," Nebukawa collected himself for a moment. "I had just concluded a business deal involving some bootleg Gundam kits."
"'Bootleg Gundam kits'?" asked Hikari, an eyebrow twitching.
"We were ready to celebrate a successful deal with a drink when the ground shook, lights flickered and went out, and there was a scream," said Nebukawa. "It was as if the world itself had screamed, it wasn't something you heard so much as felt, then it was over and we all felt 'off' somehow. My business associate excused himself, pulling out his cellphone and left in order to try and get reception bars.
"Never saw him again.
"None of us could get any reception on our phones. There was a back-up generator that the manager managed to get going. The landline phones were dead too. The cable TV was out, couldn't get local channels. So we just sat down to wait it out.
"There was something wrong with Bobo though."
"Bobo?" asked Hikari when the teacher stopped talking for a minute.
"The bartender. Who was a trained chimp. Couldn't make anything complicated, but since practically everyone just had a beer anyway - he was good for it. Except he had the jitters. Twitching got worse and worse, finally just fell over, shaking and spewing from both ends. Just up and died while we were still trying to figure out what had happened. Got the body outside and noticed the birds."
"Birds?" asked Toji, deciding it was his turn.
"Birds had just fallen over dead, even in mid-flight, just *boom* - dead," said the teacher, making a gesture with fingers spreading. "Was looking over that when I noticed the horizon wasn't looking right."
Rei glanced at Hikari, then Toji, before nodding and deciding it was her turn. "So you knew that the official cover story was untrue?"
Everyone in class stared at her.
Nebukawa snorted. "Please. Most people seized on an explanation. ANY explanation for what happened. Even if it didn't explain half the weird shit happening that day. The sky turning red? An EMP that followed the planet curvature? Water levels rising well in excess of what could be accounted for by simply melting Antarctica? Pfeh. No, stick to that for the tests as we have to stick to the official story. Some of you have brains though."
Now everyone was staring at Nebukawa.
"Anyway, I was just a minor teacher at a local high school then, specializing in Feudal Japanese History," continued Nebukawa. "Used to wear a kabuto a lot. Had a cousin out in the country who specialized in Egyptology. Anyway. Once I realized what was coming, we barricaded the place as best we could and went to the upper parts of the building. There was a dance studio, real estate office, a Yak storehouse full of porn, and some office that never managed to get a renter. Second floor was mainly some call center. Barricaded the windows there too, but the people there wouldn't leave 'cause their supervisor insisted they stay put."
The room was completely silent for a few seconds. Meiko broke it this time. "Tsunami?"
"Yeah," said Nebukawa, pulling a little silver flask out of a desk drawer and drawing a quick swig from it. "It came in, just a few feet at first. Continued to swell up. Cars floating by, some with people still in them. Water rushing by on the outside of a building and the building would usually hold. Once it broke inside though, the building would collapse. We saw everyone rushing up to the roof of a building not a hundred meters away, the building collapsing under them, then they were gone - swept away themselves. Sometimes I can still hear the screaming..."
If the silence were any more profound in the classroom it would have adjusted its tie at that point.
"We survived, me and twelve exotic dancers, there on the roof as the waters stopped rising one floor below us." Nebukawa looked out the window at the city. "Can you really blame any of us for thinking that we were there watching the world end?"
"What... what happened then?" asked Toji. It was one thing to read or hear about Second Impact in some clinical narrative. With Nebukawa's voice having shifted from the usual drone, it was almost as if one could see the events unfolding.
"Ah," said the teacher. "Then. Well, we went down to the dance studio and-"
He couldn't keep flying indefinitely, it WAS a chi technique after all.
The really odd thing had been that he HAD found a c-c-creature stuck in a tree and the owner had gotten stuck going after it. Idiot.
"There ya go," said Ranma, dropping the owner back onto the ground.
"But my cat's still stuck up there!" pointed out the owner. Literally pointing.
"So?" asked Ranma, not seeing the point.
"Aren't you going to save Grumpikins?" asked the pet owner.
"Looks perfectly fine to me," said Ranma.
"You're not even looking at her!" pointed out the pet owner.
"It's in no danger, you were ready to fall off though," counter-pointed out Ranma.
"Nyaow!" protested the beast.
"See, she's terrified... Are you okay?" asked the pet owner, noting how pale the flying boy had gotten.
"No problem," said Ranma. "You want it down right?"
"Well, duh, yeah," said the pet owner.
"Okay, just be ready to catch it," offered Ranma, before flying past the tree at high speeds.
shuummmm vizt!
The tree branch just sat there for a moment before it came off the tree. With a very startled and panicking Grumpikins still clinging to it.
The owner tried to catch his cat. Which incidently gave Grumpikins something else to stick her claws into.
"AIEEEEEE!"
Ranma smirked to himself as he flew to the nearest eatery, content in having done his good deed for the day.
"Uhm, Doctor Akagi?"
"No, Maya. I will not wear my old 'Moody Blues' t-shirt and a pair of sunglasses. I left my stoner days behind long long ago."
"..."
"Doctor Akagi, have you been getting enough sleep lately?"
Ritsuko came fully awake, realizing that she was on the bridge sitting in the command chair. "Ah. Sorry. I didn't realize..."
"Uhm, Doctor Akagi?" asked Makoto, making a gesture downwards.
Doctor Ritsuko Akagi blinked, then slowly looked down.
"When you went in to change into your plugsuit, you came back out..." said a very uncomfortable Makoto.
"..." Ritsuko Akagi blinked, looking down at herself. "Uhm. Right. Be right back."
The three bridge personnel, a slack-jawed janitor, Fuyutsuki, and Gendo Ikari all watched the nearly-naked woman go marching off.
"Fuyutsuki," said Gendo, frowning at his chair.
"Commander?" asked Fuyutsuki.
"Despite our condition of war with the Angels and current difficulties, it may be necessary for Doctor Akagi to be scheduled a vacation," said Gendo.
"It has gotten a little weird lately," agreed Fuyutsuki.
"A 'little'?" asked Shigeru.
"Watch out!" yelped a Hentai Tentacle Monster, ducking under a thrown potato peeler.
"He's a monster!" declared a second HTM as it leapt back to avoid a swipe with a meat cleaver.
An HTM who'd tried to parry with a rolled up newspaper screamed and ran, dropping the shredded periodical.
"Hmph," indicated Pen-Pen, quoting an obscure television character. ("Once again, I have cut an unworthy object.") His eyes seemed to glint from beneath the penguin-sized samurai helmet (which was actually a promotional 'prize' Misato had won from a beer company and which had the logo 'Suntory' on the back) as he held the pose for a long moment.
"Hah! I got this one boys," said one of the remaining HTM, one long tentacle wrapped around the grip of a soup ladle. "Two can play at this game!"
The two stared at each other for a few moments (which was really odd as the HTM didn't have a visible eye) before a leaf blew in from somewhere to land on the walkway in front of the apartment.
"Kiyaaaaaaaaaa!" declared the charging HTM.
Pen-Pen rushed forward, drawing his kitchen knife.
The class was silent as old man Nebukawa sighed and looked out the window. The bell had rung but there was a pause of well over a minute before the aged teacher left to go to the next class.
"It's true what they say then," Kensuke finally managed. "You really never can tell."
"Uh huh," said most of the class.
Asuka shook her head. She'd heard worse of course. There were some teachers back in Germany. Well, if this was enough to surprise the class - that sort of thing would utterly scandalize them.
Best to keep THAT to herself though.
"Is it an angel?" asked Fuyutsuki.
"Yes, sir. Just appeared in Earth orbit. One minute - nothing. The next THAT was there."
"Too bad, if we'd seen it arrive we might have a better idea of how they manage it," said Fuyutsuki. "Any satellites nearby we can hit it with?"
"Nothing that will penetrate its AT field," admitted Makoto.
"Why orbit though?" asked Shigeru.
"Probably figured it was safe from ninja sneaking up behind it," offered Makoto.
"Poor deluded angel."
Ranma pulled out his pager, saw the number and made a face.
"Another bowl, Saotome-san?"
"Nah. Wanted back at the office," answered Ranma with a shrug.
"One thing after another huh?" asked the okonomiyaki stall owner.
"Don't you know it," said Ranma. Stuff wasn't as good as Ukyo's but still pretty good. "I wonder what it is this time though."
"NO! WE MUST PREVAIL!"
A black-suited man gave a flick of the tongs and the Hentai Tentacle Monster landed with a thud in the bin.
"Watch where you're putting that!" demanded another HTM.
"What horrible fate are they going to inflict on us?!" queried a panicked third.
"Something horribly horrible I suppose," said the first HTM. "Damn you, samurai penguin!"
"I don't think he was really a samurai, dude."
"You missed an interesting class, Third Child," noted Asuka as she breezed into the room.
"It was quite informative," admitted Rei.
"Everyone settle down," warned Misato. She jerked her thumb towards the main display. "This is the next kaiju. Currently at an altitude of twenty-three thousand miles."
"We ain't got any weapons with a range like that, do we?" asked Ranma.
"Not so much, no," admitted Misato. "You don't happen to know any super-secret special manuever ninja techniques that lets you teleport up there and stab it in the back do you?"
Ranma was silent in thought for a moment before reluctantly answering. "No."
"That he had to think about that answer concerns me," noted Asuka.
"Fuyutsuki had to go join the Commander on some fact-finding mission of some kind," said Misato. "Ritsuko is being shipped off for some much needed vacation time."
"How come SHE gets vacation and WE don't?" demanded Asuka.
"She isn't a pilot," pointed out Misato. "If we really and truly need her, she can video-conference from Okinawa."
"She gets to go to Okinawa?!" asked a very upset Asuka.
"Well, having seen your grades, I'd be reluctant to give you time off anyway," countered Misato.
"It's the damn kanji!" counter-countered Asuka. "How am I supposed to provide the right answer when I can't read the question, because of the FOUR alphabets you guys use - one of them has twenty-five hundred characters! AND it apparently matters where you start making each pen-stroke because that can change the whole thing!"
"Other students manage," pointed out Misato. "Gee, Germans sure are whiny."
"We are NOT whiny," protested Asuka.
"Well, if you're here you can brush up on your kanji," said Misato.
"Uhm, kaiju on screen," pointed out Shigeru.
"Right, we don't know when the kaiju will strike," began Misato. "We're pretty sure what it is planning - and that is to enter atmosphere and guide its fall to Tokyo 3 like some asteroid from the Jurassic period."
"Cretaceous," corrected Makoto.
"Gesundheit," responded Misato absently. "Satellites sent in to investigate were crushed, so it can use its AT field to manipulate gravity."
"Hmmm?" asked Ranma.
"So, I'm in charge, and I have a plan," said Misato.
"Now I'm REALLY concerned," commented Asuka.
"We know where it is going to strike," said Misato, pointing down. "We don't know when yet. Also we don't know the precise target."
"You're planning on stationing us in the target area and then running out and intercepting it, ain't ya?" asked Ranma.
"Oh come on, that's just plain stupid," said Asuka.
Silence.
"You don't mean that actually IS the plan, do you?" asked Asuka of Misato.
"Pretty much," said Misato. "After all, if you get there ahead of the kaiju or Angel or whatever - you can extend your AT field at maximum power and try to stop it."
"Actually," said Ranma, bringing something up that had been puzzling him since he saw the original DVD. "If we bring up the AT field while its dropping, won't that stop it?"
"Yes, as long as it is maximum power," agreed Misato. "Then you have to kill the kaiju."
"Except the main attack of this kaiju is dropping like a meteor, right?" asked Ranma. "So, if you stop it - it ain't dropping no more, right?"
"You're saying it comes down like a kinetic energy weapon and if we stop it - it loses that kinetic energy," said Asuka, staring at Ranma.
"Yeah, like a punch or kick, once you've actually stopped the attack from hitting, it just kinda stalls there," said Ranma.
Misato stared at the map, then back at Ranma, then at the screen of the Angel.
"Huh," said Asuka. "What do you know. This plan has a chance of working anyway. When we do this, what happens to the redirected energy?"
"Uhm, I don't know," admitted Misato.
"Well, using the stopped punch thing, you redirect the energy outwards, right?" asked Ranma. "So if the AT fields are absorbing it - wouldn't it burst outward in all directions?"
"An air burst," said Asuka, sounding thoughtful. "Hope nothing we want to keep is near the impact site. Maybe some way of deflecting it skyward?"
"Good, sounds like a project. Get to work on it," not-suggested Misato.
Plop! Clang!
"Oh no! We're being thrown into individual cells! I'll never see my iPod again. Never have the chance to hold my dear Asuka in my hands."
"Dude. We're Hentai Tentacle Monsters. No hands. And you never did."
"What is it with this place? Our cages are little tubes and little drains in the bottom of the tubes." The HTM tried the grill up top but it was carrying a moderate electrical current.
After the last of the guards went away, the ceiling lit up.
"It's a movie theatre? And now they're going to show us awful films and make us give sarcastic commentary. It's even worse than I thought!"
"What's 'Stagg Films' - never heard of it."
There was brief silence as the HTM prepared for whatever evil was to be inflicted on them.
"Bom-chika-wow-wow," said one finally.
"Why would a bank teller refer to that part of her anatomy as a 'safe deposit box'?"
"You know, if we actually knew anything about the society of the lilim in general - I have a feeling most of the dialogue would make a lot more sense."
"They're?!"
"On a stack of paper like that? That can't be sanitary."
"No no no, dude! You don't want to make a withdrawal! She just offered you compound interest. I have no idea what those are but it sounds good."
"No shrine priestess? No barely dressed schoolgirls? No leather-clad dominatrix teachers? Oh the cruelty!"
"Oh. That must be the bank manager there with the whip. Any other complaints?"
"Nah. I'm cool."
AUTHOR'S NOTES:
Since it's been awhile since i've gotten ANY response from Kender, it looks like this will be continued on my own. Same with No Tendo and a few other pieces. i've written more of No Tendo and will post a new chapter eventually as time allows.