Rei's injured, which means the time to Sachiel is rapidly ticking down. She's calling Shinji by some very close names, which is a fairly visible death flag. The game's next week and THE PROM IS TOMORROW!

As an actual note, I'm not going to use honorifics or words/phrases that are easily translatable. I maintain the same stance on that as I do in Just Another, and it will only be in the humourous situations that I will relent.

Robot Ninja Kamina is now Canon

The training began soon after, nearly every day after school he would go down to the Geofront and be shut inside a metal tube filled with a breathable orange liquid. Shinji found it getting harder by the day to keep his new occupation secret, but his next door neighbour, Misato, solved at least half of that problem by herself. One afternoon, when he was given time off from training in the purple beast that was now his Unit, Toji and Kensuke decided to invite themselves to his apartment. Misato, having taken the day off for 'illness' and not 'hangover', heard him come home and invited herself over too.

"A good afternoon to you, Master Ikari." She said, her voice adopting a haughty tone. "I'll see myself out." She continued, never making it through the entryway under Shinji's glare. A moment later, Toji turned himself back to face Shinji after having twisted his entire spine around the chair.

"Ignoring the whole 'how is she such a babe' part of the conversation for the moment, Ikari?"

"It's my actual surname. My father had me live here under a different name to protect both of us." Shinji's words were heavily punctuated by sighs.

Toji put his hands forward in a way that that said he was trying to grasp a fundamental thread of thought this conversation had brought forth. "Your dad runs NERV!" He exclaimed.

"Yes." Shinji replied, trying to ignore Kensuke's devotion to getting a closeup of his left cheek. "Can you keep this a secret?"

"Depends, do you have men in black suits following you everywhere?" Kensuke asked, managing to talk over the knock at the door. Toji, being closer, went to answer it.

"He does."

...

Three days later, after Shinji had finished off another session of 'don't drown in orange juice', he decided to visit his sister in the Geofront's hospital wing. He had to ask a nurse wandering the halls for directions, but he eventually found the room he was supposed to enter.

"Hello." He said as he entered. "Thought you could do with some company."

"You were lied to." Ayanami said the moment she noticed him, not turning her face away from the window. "I am more closely based on genetic material from your mother than I should be to be called your sister."

Shinji smirked. "You know, that's not really that bad, I thought you meant you weren't even a clone or something." He walked over to the bedside and took a seat. "But even if you're my aunt or my cousin or my sister or something I want to help you and be your friend I guess."

"Despite the advances Doctor Akagi has made with your mother's notes, this body will begin to break down before I reach twenty-five. Can you help that? As my nephew, my cousin or brother?"

Shinji reached across the bed and took Rei's uninjured hand in his own two. "I don't know if I can help with that, I don't know enough to make you live longer. But I can stop these Angels. I don't care that my father is manipulating me any more, if I defeat all the Angels then they can spend more time on making you live longer."

Rei looked down at her hand in a slight shock. But she maintained her composure. "If all the Angels are defeated, then logically I will be left to die, being the artificially generated piloting system."

Shinji gave a troubled smile, tears welling up in his eyes. "I know it's silly for me to be this attached to you, but you can't want to just die like that. Nobody does." Shinji reached into his bag, withdrawing a small brown book. "I didn't know if you read much, so I just got you a book the librarian said would be alright. I mean, I'm your older brother or whatever, so I figured I should get you something."

"I suppose 'thank you' is the correct response? Thank you, o-onii-san."

"Ok saying it like that sounds weird, maybe just call me Shinji."

"Agreed."

There was silence between the two for a moment, Shinji unsure of his perceived relationship with Rei and Rei unsure of why emotions were a thing. Shinji took it upon himself to break the awkward silence that he had caused.

"If it's not to forward of me to ask, why are you so badly injured?"

Rei took a moment to think of an adequate response. "Evangelion Unit-00 is the original prototype, created merely to test our ability to create an Eva. In the hopes that we would both pilot an Eva each, the Commander had the control system updated and tested. As I am an artificial being designed to synchronise with the Eva, I was used as a test pilot. Unit-00 went berserk and caused serious damage to the simulation facility."

"It's that dangerous when you're just testing it? If Unit-01 is that much more stable, why is my father trying to use Unit-00?"

"I wasn't wounded by the Eva; the plug ejection mechanism wasn't designed to work within such a small area. These injuries are the result of falling fifty metres in near-boiling LCL. If there was nothing else, you can go."

Shinji looked shocked for a moment, then rose from the chair. "If I'm too boring, you can just tell me." With a smile, Shinji turned to go. "Get well soon, I don't particularly want to doom humanity with my incompetence."

...

The old man Shinji passed in the hallway caught his shoulder and began to speak. "You've been lied to." He said.

"Ayanami already said that. Is this something different?"

"Of course it is." The old man smiled with wry sadism. "Everyone at NERV will lie to you about something. I, for example, had nothing to do with Rei's development, against what your father would like you to believe. I suppose it's for the best that we get the big lies out of the way now."

Shinji looked at the old man that he surmised was Professor Fuyutsuki. "And what lie will you tell me?"

"Your shirt is pink." Fuyutsuki said, continuing on his merry way through the labyrinth that was NERV.

...

Commander Gendo Ikari waited patiently in his office for his Sub-Commander, not a single implement on the desk moving out of place, all three of them. Kozou Fuyutsuki entered through the main doors, traversing the cavernous space to stand directly across from the desk.

"I take it you've had your fun? You didn't do any lasting damage I hope."

"None at all sir. In fact, the Third Child likely believes myself and the First Child to be the only trustworthy people that work with NERV."

"What of our new Operations Director? Surely she has her own motives for the Angels."

"Aside from destroying them, I doubt she even cares what they're for."

...

A few days later Shinji received a message from NERV just as he was about to leave for school. It wasn't the same as the usual time-only format that told him when to be at a Synch test; this one had actual words. Checking the sender number again, Shinji tried to find some reason for NERV to begin using coherent sentences in their messages.

'DON'T GO TO SCHOOL.' It read, 'IT'S NEARLY HERE.' The next line elucidated.

In a state of mild confusion, Shinji almost dropped the phone when it began to ring. It never rang.

"Hello, Rokubungi speaking."

"Shinji, it's Lieutenant Hyuuga, I'm with the Operations crew on the bridge." The man was familiar to him, he at least remembered his voice from the various people speaking during a Synch test. "Someone just bounced a message through the Geofront's communication grid. We don't know who sent it, but come down to the Geofront anyway just in case."

"What about school?" Shinji asked, actually sort of wanting to go for once.

"Nevermind that, this may be an Angel or just a scare, but it's better for you to be ready either way."

...

The best guess turned out to be the correct guess. It took a lot of waiting, but an hour before school would have let out an emergency situation was declared by the JSDF. Then followed another hour and a half of watching the U.N. Armed Forces try to hold off the Angel. With the permission of his father, someone routed the feed from the automated defenses to Unit-01. Shinji effectively had a front-row seat to the spectacle of the Angel, a giant green humanoid, lancing several VTOLs with pink spears that grew from its hands. It avoided, where it could, the individual air defenses, electing to make extended jumps across the landscape. When an N2 mine was dropped on it to little effect, the combined JSDF-U.N. committee authorised the use of the Evangelion.

Shinji launched to intercept the Angel on one of the many rail catapults running from the Geofront to the city above. He'd spent a long time trying to memorise all the weapon supply points, external power points and defense hard-points for when he eventually went into battle, but his mind was blank now.

Fight, survive, win.

BE WORTHY

...

"Doctor Akagi, there's an abnormal pulse flow on the psychograph." Lieutenant Ibuki called out, inciting her superior to approach the display. Tapping the display with a pen, Akagi verified its legitimacy, then thought on its meaning.

"Its passing directly through the audio centre. If this is generated by an outside force, they have a very good understanding of the human mind."

"Is this something that needs sharing, Doctor?" Gendo said, his voice calm as he watched his own son fight against the monster.

"Something is causing stimulus in the pilot's brain, I believe it's causing him auditory hallucinations. Your orders?"

"Remain as you were, until the pilot is negatively affected by this, we shouldn't interfere."

So NERV just watched. They watched as Unit-01 fled the Angel to take cover behind a building. They watched as Shinji held his hands to his ears to block the sounds out.

They watched as the Synch ratio dropped to zero.

They watched as the Evangelion kept moving.

Gendo watched with a smile on his face.

...

Shinji didn't recognise the ceiling when he woke up. He didn't know exactly where he was, but if he had to hazard a guess he was in the Geofront hospital. Less than an hour after he had woken there was a nurse tending to him and ensuring his faculties were unimpaired. Once that was over, Doctor Akagi came into the room and began to ask him questions, many of them based on the voice he had heard while fighting the Angel.

"It kept saying I wasn't worthy, and that it would make me worthy. Was it the Angel?"

"We don't know, but until we do know, tell us anything you remember." Doctor Akagi began to scribble things on her clipboard, but Shinji couldn't see what she was writing from where he was.

"I'll try Doctor. Was there anything else?"

"Not at the moment Shinji. Misato will be around in a while to take you home, so just rest easy till then." Doctor Akagi smiled then walked out the door, leaving Shinji alone with his thoughts.

And the squeaking, clicking sound that accompanies someone walking on crutches

...

Misato dropped the stack of papers onto Ritsuko's desk, the blast of wind they kicked up flipping over the other scattered pages the good doctor had open.

"Do you mind telling me what these are about? And don't lie, I know you're riding his dick."

Ritsuko stubbed out her cigarette in the ash tray. "What ever could you mean Misato?"

"The Commander's dick; you're riding it. And you're going to tell me why I'm supposed to approve the re-assignment of Rei's housing." Misato said. It was almost possible to see the individual hairs in her nose twitch as she tried to snort menacingly.

"Rei put the case to the Commander that placing her next door or otherwise nearby to Shinji's apartment or yours would make it easier for Section Two's security teams to divvy up men during the night and other suitable times. She had apparently gathered reports from her own security detail on how positively wonderful it would be." Taking out another cigarette, Ritsuko offered one to Misato. Lighting her own, she continued once she was certain Misato didn't want one. "In short, Rei's moving in, there's no free apartments either side and the Commander doesn't trust you to look after Rei."

"The Commander doesn't trust me, but he's putting Rei in with me anyway? Are you literally fucking his brains out?"

Ritsuko sighed. "And now I'm certain you didn't read the whole thing."

"I skimmed it." Misato pouted.

"A good portion of that stack there is about you moving in with Shinji. Tell him when you go pick him up why don't you?" Ritsuko smiled at her old friend, a flick of her eyebrows saying 'you forgot that bit didn't you?'

"Oh god I need to do that too? You didn't say I needed to take him home. Do you know what my prospect for getting laid in this town will be if I say 'Oh no, I can't take you back to mine, I'm looking after a fourteen year old boy'? Just about nil!"

"You shouldn't be worried about finding men in this town, the ones you find are probably Section Two plants to make sure you don't get weird diseases. Besides, Shinji actually knows how to cook, so it's not all bad."

"Fine," Misato said, flicking through the stack to sign the relevant sections. "But I want a second fridge for my beer."

"Non-negotiable, one fridge per apartment. You can bring Pen-Pen's box over though, that doesn't count."

Meanwhile, in a parallel universe where Shinji was cool

As Simon walked away from his own wedding, he wondered what would become of the world. Sure he - the strongest spiral warrior in the known universe - was swearing off outrageous displays of power, but there were a dozen others that could cause just as much devastation.

"Come on Boota, we've got a universe to protect, holes to drill and a grave to dig. Can't take too long with all that." He whispered, directing his words to the small mole-pig riding on his shoulder. For his part, Simon's oldest companion responded with a loud 'buiiiiii'.

Neither of them noticed the illusory girl standing in front of them before they had walked through her.

You are powerful. Will you help me?

"You hear that Boota? I'm hearing wei-ok you weren't there before."

My world is in danger. Will you help me?

"Don't mean to sound mean or anything, but I already saved all the worlds in the universe." Simon scratched his own head then Boota's in confusion. The girl looked up to the sky which had suddenly darkened. She pointed up to the stars, then to herself.

My world is beyond any world. Will you help me?

Simon tried to politely decline. "I just recently gave up fighting to save people in what I assume will be a large-scale war. Sorry, but I'll have to decline." The girl shook her head.

I don't need your power, I need your spirit. Will you help me?

"You mean to say you're reaching out across distances I cannot comprehend just to ask me to motivate you?" Simon held his hands out for a moment, then withdrew them.

Yes. Will you help me?

A voice spoke up from behind Simon. This voice was older, weathered with age.

"My answer is the same as twenty years ago: sure thing!"

The girl smiled then, the first real emotion Simon had seen from her. She held a hand out to the side and twisted, bringing reality to a point of great strain. With a great struggle she opened a hole through space, beyond even what could be achieved with spiral power. With a flick of her wrist, the girl flung at Simon, encasing him in the void between worlds.

Meanwhile, in a parallel universe where Kamina was a police car

A collapsing wormhole leading to a replicated solar system. Not the best of places to die, but it certainly beat losing to the Primevals, or letting the 11 Solar Masters turn the entire universe inside out just because of their programming. They'd sent Mamoru and Kaido off through the rapidly closing exit and consigned themselves to their fate. Guy was there, holding Mikoto in his arms, when time slowed to a halt.

"You're quite a courageous man. Care to jump back into the fray and save another world?" The voice came from within his own mind, but he also sensed it had an origin point outside of himself. Outside the small escape craft, resting on the bow of the J-Ark, was GaoGaiGar. Sitting on the front of the chest piece that was Galeon was a boy, barely into his teens. Even though he was so far away, it was quite obvious that he was looking at Guy and Guy alone. "I'm representing a power greater than anything you could comprehend through human methods, but we find ourselves in need of assistance. I also found you in need of a purpose."

The boy rose from his position and flew towards the ship. He stepped through the reinforced glass of the impromptu bridge as if it wasn't there at all. The boy smiled a curious smile, then tapped Guy on the forehead.

The effect was instant.

"Galeoria Road, is it not? I think I have just what you need and more."

Space ripped and reformed, a single point extending to infinity. The receding wormhole quickly reversed and twisted. A tunnel through space made anew. The boy pulled, and Guy came along with him.

Hey, I just had a thought. since a Lilin's A.T. Field is insular, in certain terms, would Shinji be able to see a Shinigami from the Bleach-verse? I was thinking, since Bleach-verse souls are about emission and diffusion and A.T. Fields are about keeping things out, would Shinji even be able to see a high-level reishi being?

What I mean is, would Shinji be able to punch out Aizen, even when he's a transcendent butterfly monster?

AHAHAHAHAHA, YOU ALL THOUGHT IT WOULD BE ICHIGO, DIDN'T YOU?

YOUR TEARS ARE DELICIOUS.