We held hands the entire flight back to Second Branch and afterwards, right up to the point where my dad's driver picked me up from the airfield with my luggage. My brain had by then gone into complete neutral, but my heart was light and I couldn't sleep that night at all despite how tired I was.
The next ten days were a furious blur of activity, as both of our Evangelions were ready for the next stage. We spent practically the entire stretch of each day in training, in classrooms, or in simulators, or in the units themselves. Dad was busier that either of us, spending nearly all of this time at the lab or at the secret operations area, seeing to various components and adjustments being made to our two giants. I had barely seen him since I returned from Maine, perhaps only during a live EVA activation would he be in the control room and then we'd just catch up for a few minutes when I got out of the entry plug. Afterwards then I'd go back to the penthouse and he'd stay at the cages or in the lab, I didn't seem him back home that I can remember.
We were told that despite the fact we could activate our EVAs they still weren't complete enough to use in battle and it would take a while longer, weeks or more, to get them completely ready. That meant we had to look forward to a life of late night training out of sight for some time to come.
Despite how busy we were, Vance and I still found time to be together, and we were together every single day. On most days he'd greet me in the commissary where he'd give me a hug to start the day, then we'd eat breakfast together at our own table and talk about anything and everything. Now that I had been to his home in Maine he then told me many stories about his adventures on the lake or out in the woods and it all seemed like so much fun. I already wanted desperately to go back.
We were usually in some sort of training most of the day and we'd run though it all together, sometimes we'd take turns in various simulators while the other would wait, and I'd catch up on reading (by this point I was also a devotee of romance novels, and devoured them ravenously) when I wasn't in a training session myself. Then we'd get dinner, again together at our own table, and often we'd chat or relax and play games with each other. I found myself not at all afraid to be affectionate with him, despite his larger size and seemingly tough attitude Vance had a lot of soft spots and I found all of them, including how ticklish he actually was. The others we worked with didn't really say anything to us but didn't dissuade us from public displays of affection either, and he'd make a game of stealing kisses from me while we were in between training sessions or just about to get back into our units while we were on the cages.
The training itself got more complex, our simulated missions were more and more like military drills where we'd actually drop into a target by parachutes and then have to kill everything inside, the target was almost always some type of underground fortress and the defenders other simulated EVA units. The difficulty levels were also higher, it became harder and harder to eliminate our opponents. Still we kept up with it, we were so busy between multiple runs a day and a final night session of an hour with the actual EVAs that there wasn't much time to think about what was coming over the horizon. Maybe I didn't want to think about it, I was happy now with a boyfriend and having something interesting and important to do, the fulfillment of all of the frustrations of my sucky childhood. Maybe it was dangerous but EVA was just as powerful as anything I could think of and I felt confident when I piloted her that nothing could really stop us.
After a week and a half of all of this intensity we were finally given a break, a whole day without any training or other EVA stuff, and Vance asked if wouldn't mind going with him on an actual, real live date. I told him I couldn't wait.
The plan was that we'd spend the afternoon in R&R, and then get dinner and see a movie later that night. It was about that point when I starting thinking to myself "should I tell dad I'm doing this?" I mean, did I need his permission to date a boy? As we had never had the "birds and bees" kind of talk between us I wasn't entirely sure and as paranoid as dad got at times it did finally dawn on me that I probably needed to say something at some time to him about Vance.
Then again I was pretty sure Dad was already in the know about Vance and I. For one thing there wasn't any time when I wasn't out of sight of base security and I knew he could follow me wherever I went. Even when I was out of doors I knew that if I saw a small drone up in the air it was likely focusing at least a camera on me. But I had grown up with the security and it had never impacted anything I did before once I realized it was there.
Also, going to Maine was Dad's idea, and Vance, being an EVA pilot and all, was certainly in on the base's big secret. So there was no way he didn't know, I concluded, and if dad really objected I'm sure something would have come up by now. In the very, very back of my mind I wondered what would happen if I took Vance home to the penthouse one day. But I was enjoying things as they were now and I really didn't want to push it at all, afraid that my fantasy bubble would pop at any moment.
I woke up and spent a long time that morning getting ready. By this point in my life I had a decent selection of good outfits, most of which I barely or never wore, and so I tried to figure out what would be best. After trying on several ones I fell back on the dress Vance's mom gave me if only because it was so comfortable compared to some of my others. Once that was figured out I did all the other stuff to girl me up, such as paint my nails a bright red, then picked out emerald-green stud earrings and worked for nearly an hour at the mirror on my makeup. This time I went all out: bright red lipstick plus mascara, shadow, and even a bit of rouge which Jo had taught me how to do. I finished off with a white hairband to keep my bangs under control, as I still wore my hair at neck-length but with long bangs in front. Then I put on the highest heels I owned, which were a pair of four-inch high white wedge sandals, and headed for the door.
When I got downstairs and outside our tower there was a camouflage painted base security Hummer, or HMMWV they called it, parked outside. I had expected that maybe Vance asked his dad to provide transportation but was surprised when I saw Vance himself, wearing a black leather jacket, t-shirt and camouflage utility pants with boots, emerge from the driver's seat. "You know how to drive?!" I said I astonishment.
"Yeah," he said with bravado, pretending to polish his chest. "My dad's the base security chief so who's going to stop me anyway?"
I got into the passenger's seat in the front cabin with a bit of help from Vance as it was so high off the ground, if I had known that I'd have to be pushed five feet upwards wearing a mini-dress and heels I might have gone with a different outfit that day, as Vance was pretty pleased with himself after he boosted me up and into the cabin. Once buckled inside Vance took me straight to R&R and he did so practically speeding down the base roads, even taking one of the turns on edge like a racecar. A little scary but also fun, I squealed as he made the turn with a loud screech and burned rubber on the rest of his way to R&R.
Fortunately he wasn't pulled over and we both got out, again I needed help to make it down from the cabin and really had wished that day I had at least worn some bike shorts underneath the dress considering there was a strong breeze that afternoon. No matter, I guess teenage boys probably live for trying to get a glimpse of your panties, and I'm pretty sure Vance got a good view of mine for a least half a second as I climbed out of the cabin of the Hummer.
We walked hand in hand into the arcade portion of R&R and then proceeded to play everything in sight. Since piloting EVA I had gotten pretty decent at shooting games of all kinds, while Vance naturally had the high score on nearly every game in the arcade, with the prominent initials "VV" visible atop the winner's list. That lasted for about an hour when we wondered over to the carnival games on the other side of the arcade.
Given the large number of engineers and techs working at Second Branch, it would make sense that R&R had a huge arcade with all of the latest games for everyone to blow off stress at. They also had several of the old-style carnival games where you'd toss a dart or shoot targets to get a prize. After playing around a little I saw a shooting gallery game where the top prize was a giant stuffed tiger about three feet long. Well, I decided I had to have it and very cutely preened on Vance until he agreed to blow the rest of his arcade money on several rounds of shooting targets. As I said before, Vance is an incredibly good shot and it didn't take long for him to win my prize. Grabbing my new best friend like an oversized teddy bear, we walked out of the arcade but not before stopping by an instant photo booth to commemorate the event. We took several pictures together that day, and I remember gently kissing him on the cheek at the end of the photo shoot, just to show my appreciation.
Try as I might I couldn't get Vance into the Chinese restaurant for our late lunch, and while he was pretty easy with me for everything else, on that issue he stubbornly didn't budge as he hated Chinese food. We settled on Mexican food and sat and talked while the two of us munched on tacos as my new tiger friend watched on.
We caught our movie afterwards. This time he left the choice to me and I picked one of the Star Wars films, which were my favorites growing up. We sat in the small media theatre just the three of us and I held Vance's hand the whole time while I relieved the story where the hero finds out that his dad was an evil monster while his secret twin saves him after their minds somehow link together.
By the time we got out of the theatre the sun was starting to go down, and I asked Vance if we could go see the sunset. He agreed, and we took the Hummer to the southwest edge of the base.
Before we had the penthouse in the tower, and before Second Branch was a big place my family had a small house in the outer part of the base. It was there that I lived when I was very young, when my mother was still alive. Where we went with the Hummer was just around where we lived before, and while the old house wasn't there anymore I still barely remembered the area, as there was a security fence about five hundred yards just in front of us with armed sentries at several places around the base perimeter. We got out of the Hummer, this time I took off my sandals first before I got out which made it a lot easier.
The two of us walked for a bit around the area, as the sun was still slowly descending in the western horizon. "So this is where you lived before?" Vance asked.
"Yup. Right up until I was four."
"Were you born on base?"
"Supposedly my birth certificate says Las Vegas, the city still had people living there back then. But I don't ever remember being anywhere else but here."
We were just chatting as we walked along when I saw something in a small ridge close by. Letting go of Vance I scurried to where the ridge was and then knelt down. In the folds of the dry earth there was a small spot where water, maybe from a natural spring down below, had bubbled up to the surface. And on that spot were flowers, very small yellow and purple wildflowers. I remembered the flowers because they looked just like the ones my mother used to plant in hopes of making a garden bed full of desert bloom.
Being very careful not to harm any of them I knelt closer and got a good look at all of these little flower and flower buds that had somehow survived being in 110-degree heat for most of the summer. There weren't very many of them, and without the underground water there's no way any of them could have been alive at all. It was amazing to see those grow despite all of the dry desert that was around us.
Vance was unimpressed. "They're just flowers."
"Nothing grows here, in case you haven't noticed," I replied. "It's a miracle any of these are here at all."
"So what are you going to do, bring them home?"
"I can't, otherwise they'll die. I can only leave them here and hope for them to keep going."
Besides giving the tiny blooms a chance for live, the open spring also attracted whatever small wildlife was here. While the desert is hot and dry for most of the year, there's a lot more going on in nature that most people just don't notice. But because we lived in a city of ten thousand people who all ate things and then threw out the remainder as trash, all of that leftover food was like a giant magnet to wildlife for miles around. It wasn't unusual to see small mice or other rodents around the base scavenging on our garbage, and that in turn brought in predators such as hawks or snakes. There weren't many larger animals around but if you kept a sharp eye you could spot rabbits or even foxes sneaking around. I know this because when I was younger I used to spy on the base grounds from my townhouse's balcony with a set of binoculars, and I'd see wildlife come around all of the time.
As I looked around not only did I spot a few little rodent-like animals but also saw two jackrabbits in the near distance. I stopped and got a good look at both of them, as it was pretty rare to get so close.
"Vee, look!" I pointed to Vance, speaking in a whisper. "Bunnies."
"Rabbits? Oh, cool!"
For a moment I thought Vance was going to just enjoy the nature sightseeing like I was, but then I realized he had other plans. He rushed to the back of the Hummer and opened up the trunk. Almost a minute later he came around to the ridge, in his right hand was a hunting rifle with scope.
"Vee?! No, please don't!"
He looked at where the two jackrabbits had frozen in place while watching us watch them. "You think that's maybe a hundred or two hundred yards where they're at?"
I gasped in horror when I realized what Vance was going to do with the rifle. "Vance. Vance! Don't do this!" But Vance just ignored me and loaded a cartridge into the chamber. The two rabbits got a sniff of us and decided to run, and I certainly couldn't blame them.
"Vance! Vance! Don't. Don't shoot them!" Vance totally ignored me, and with his rifle scope took a bead on one of the running rabbits. I still couldn't believe he was going to do this while on a date with me. "Vance? VANCE!"
He pulled the trigger once and in the distance there was a flash of smoke followed by a small red splash. Vance quickly pulled out the rifle bolt and ejected the spent cartridge. By this time I was screaming at him to stop.
"Vance, stop it! Stop it! Don't kill them! VANCE!"
I watched helplessly as the second rabbit tried to make it to the perimeter fence. There was a second shot, followed by another small red puff in the distance. Vance ejected the second cartridge, and started walking towards where he had shot the first rabbit.
Angered and terrified, I had broken down into tears after he had so casually killed both of the jackrabbits. I was furious at the boy. Here we were in the most romantic thing we had done since Maine and he decides to kill two helpless animals in the middle of it. Unable to cope with this and feeling increasingly angry at Vance, I turned around and headed for the road back to my townhouse.
It wasn't until he had nearly reached the corpse of the first rabbit when Vance noticed that I was gone. Upon seeing me walk on the road back home, he hurried to catch up. I didn't even look at him, I couldn't and not just because my tears had become so heavy that I had black mascara running down my face.
"Erin, Erin? Wait up!" he said to me as he tried to catch me but I just kept moving. Finally he ran and then kept pace as I marched away from the scene. "Erin, hey, don't tell me you're pissed over this!" I said nothing but just kept moving away from him as fast as I could walk.
"Erin? Come on, it's just for fun!" he tried to grab hold of my arm but I shook it off as hard as I could. Determined not to see his face again, I picked up my pace to a run, and tried to make it to my place before I completely broke down. Vance kept calling out to me but after a while even he stopped and I left him at the side of the black asphalt road. Finally I ditched the sandals and went at a full run all the way back to my apartment tower. My mind was full of white noise, it was like everything around me just went dull and dim and all I could hear was the sound of my own panting.
Eventually I made it to the foyer and went straight to the elevator. Within another two minutes the door to our place opened and I bolted inside, not even bothering to close the front door behind me. I plopped in my bed and buried my face in my pillow, just sobbing as I had felt my heart was ripped out. Was I overreacting? Probably, but at the moment the trauma was just too fresh: someone I had felt real affection for had just slayed two innocent animals right in front of me and I didn't know how to react other than just to run away and feel so sorry that I had let myself get so close to something so terrible. I just didn't care, as it seemed just when I got to reach some pinnacle of happiness the floor always dropped out from underneath me. So again I cried myself to sleep.
I woke up later the next morning and slowly got myself started up for the day. Still unsettled from yesterday's trauma, I wasn't entirely sure how to go from here. The only thing I did know was that I didn't want to see Vance today and I'd do anything in my power to make sure that happened.
My current training schedule usually called us to start simulations and any classes in the mid-afternoon and then actual work with the EVAs at night. How I had been starting my day since Vance and I were going out was by rushing out of the house by eleven and then finding him to have lunch and hang out before anything started. I decided today I would try to get back to what things were like before he showed up.
In my pre-piloting days I had usually started most mornings with about a half-hour to stretch and work out in my bedroom even before I got out to get breakfast. When I was ten I asked dad if he could have his people install a ballet barre and mirrors on one wall of my bedroom and he thankfully complied, making at least one side of my room into a mini dance studio. Then once I woke up I'd get dressed and then do a series of exercises to get my muscles warmed up. It really helped my flexibility to do that nearly daily, not to mention it was a great way to calm down and sort of think about what the day would be like. When EVA came around however, I ended up waking up much later and drowsier as we were staying up very, very late with training and I got out of the habit of my daily stretching.
One of my little pleasures in life is putting on a brand-new leotard and stretching out in it. It's a rather nice feeling to have that against your skin, and a good leo should keep you warm, absorb sweat and move completely with you without being too tight or having wedgies in the wrong places. I had earlier bought a soft green camisole leotard made in Japan that was fabricated from a new type of nylon material. It wasn't really for gymnastics but from the catalog description it seemed like it would be very comfortable and when I finally tried it on today it was, fitting me nice and snug and feeling like a second skin.
I spent the next half an hour at the barre, doing various poses and stretches which were a combination of things from both ballet and gym. I never had actual ballet schooling, I didn't even own a pair of dance slippers, but my coaches would teach me things that helped my muscles get better toned and gave me better poise, and so I'd quietly go through this repetitive set of exercises that covered everything from turnouts and piles to arabesques.
While worked out at the barre, my mind went to what to do about Vance. I still had felt terrible about the previous day, as at least I has having the time of my life on such a fun date and then he goes and ruins it by killing two rabbits like it was nobody's business. Maybe my earlier suspicions were right about him, that Vance was just a violent thug who could occasionally be charming and warm. I was probably much better off without him.
But there were other things to consider, and one was that he did come from a different world than mine. Here I was, the Princess of Second Branch, who hadn't truly suffered a day in her life while Vance at least had seen the outside world. Maybe where they lived in Maine was okay, but there were a lot of worse off areas and him and his dad and seen a lot of bad things. I guess that could do something to you.
There was also the practical issue that we piloted and trained together. As much as I wanted to, I doubt I could persuade my father to switch out Vance for another pilot. Dad had told me that EVA was literally built around the pilot, that there was no one else in the world that could pilot my EVA, and the same would be true for Vance. Like it or not I'd be stuck with him even if we did breakup, and considering just how important it was what we were doing I wasn't really in a position to do anything about it. But it would be painful and awkward to be with Vance afterwards, and I dreaded having to go through that.
I didn't really know what to do, as part of me increasingly wanted to just forget what happened yesterday and try to reset somehow. I already missed his warm embrace, and I knew I was going to really miss getting a kiss good night from him. Not sure of the plan I decided to just avoid him for the day as much as possible, and just not let him get close to me. I had a right to be angry, and I was still really angry at this moment.
I finally left the penthouse about one o'clock, still wearing my new leo but paired up with a white pleated skirt and a pair of white ballet flats. It was really hot that day as it was early August, and it felt like a sauna outside so I was glad I wasn't wearing much on. My dad's driver took me to the EVA training area, which was out the outskirts of the base and designed to look from the outside like a warehouse and not anything important. I decided to go through my training courses for the day and if possible try and break away during the dinner period by going to the pool and eating there after swimming, and on a day like this I already wanted to cool off.
Unfortunately when I got through all of the security checkpoints and finally underground, Vance was waiting for me in front of the locker rooms. He was dressed in normal athletic wear, and held my giant stuffed tiger price in his hands. Shit, I thought to myself, there's gonna be no avoiding him today.
"Hey, Tiger," he said to me softly, trying to get back to his charming side. I just pushed by him, trying to make my way into my locker room where at least I'd be isolated for a few moments before our first training period. Vance however shifted his position to just in front of the locker room door. I could feel my anger really coming on but I tried as hard as I could to clamp it down. "Vance," I said in a soft but stern voice, "would you please let me get inside."
He looked at me like I hadn't understood anything he had just said. "You know," he said, pointing at the tiger in his hands, "he really missed you last night. I had to sleep with him just to calm him down and this guy really snores!"
Not funny I decided, and I again try to push my way to the door but Vance wouldn't budge. "Vance," I repeated to him, "please get out of my way."
"Sure, fine," he said as he relented, allowing me to open the door and get inside. I didn't need to change into anything just yet as we mostly had classroom-type instruction today, so I just grabbed a notebook out of the locker that was inside the room along with a pen. I took my time arranging everything, hoping Vance would at least get the message that I didn't' want to talk to him today. But that wasn't going to happen.
"You know, Tiger," he said from the other side of the door. "You should know I gave those rabbits a good gravesite."
That did it. I swiveled around and burst through the door ready to punch him. "Yeah, and they wouldn't be dead if it wasn't for you!" I shouted at him. Vance backed off if only just slightly, dropping the tiger on the floor and putting his hands in front of him for protection. "Well, you don't know that."
"What do you mean? Of course they'd still be alive!"
"Except you do know wolves come out at night around here, right?"
"So!?"
"So, what I'm trying to say is that I buried them. Deep, so that nothing gets to them and some wolf doesn't dig them up for dinnertime. And their little rabbit families can have a funeral for them later on."
I really didn't have patience for this and finally let the gates burst open. "You asshole! Here we finally have a real date and everything was so wonderful with you and then you go and just blow those two away like that! How the hell could you do that to me?"
Vance looked at me calmly, shrugging his shoulders. "It's just who I am"
"Bullshit!"
"Hey, I wouldn't try to stop you from doing flips and twirls, would I? That's who you are, right?"
"Yeah, so?"
"So, that's the real truth about me, Erin. I'm a killer. That's who I am."
That was exactly what I was afraid of, and it was then I decided that we were done. "Go to hell," was all that I could mutter under my breath and I tried to push my way aside him and down the hallway towards our classroom. I only barely got by him until his hand was firmly around my wrist.
I gave him a good solid punch in the ribs and he flinched just a little but kept his grip firm. I tried again, this time shoving him all the way back into the wall but he still hung on to me. Finally I tried a judo flip on him by quickly pivoting to get his arm under my shoulder but he could see what I was trying and then pushed me back forcefully against the other wall.
We looked at each other, each one of us angry at the other. My face was flush red and quivering with emotion as I really just wanted to get away. I felt like screaming and I knew that if I said just the right thing loud enough dad's bodyguards, the ones that shadowed us nearly everywhere, would come running and even big and strong Vance couldn't defend himself against them.
"You want to hate me for being me you go right ahead," he told me to my face, "but before you do I want you to see something first."
"Like what?!"
"Come here," he finally said and then dragged me by the wrist down the hall.
We ended up at the pilot ready room, a regular-sized room with a few leather easy chairs and a large video screen on one side. This was usually where we got our mission briefings before working with the EVAs and it was set up similar to the pilot ready rooms that the military would use. Vance dragged me inside and pushed me down into one of the leather chairs, then went to the front and grabbed a remote control from the wall mount. He turned on the main screen.
"I want you to watch this," he demanded of me. I didn't say anything, still shocked that Vance dragged me here and shoved me into a chair.
The main screen started to play a video and at first there was a bunch of official-looking information from NERV's main location in Japan. Much of the wording was in Japanese, but there was also English there and those parts I could read. The first segment had a title called "UNIT 01 VS THIRD ANGEL COMBAT FOOTAGE TOKYO-III 2015.6.10." In the video footage, I saw one of the other EVA units, a large figure in with purple skin along with glowing green stripes. It had a giant spike or horn on top of its helmet, and stood at one side of a large city. On the other side was what I could only figure was an Angel, a massive bipedal and slightly humanoid figure in black and white, with a grotesque mask-like face.
As the Evangelion started to move towards the Angel, it took a step and then suddenly collapsed onto the ground. As it struggled to move, the Angel took no time in attacking, rushing towards the EVA with amazing speed and grabbing it off of the ground. A rod-like weapon came slamming down into the EVA's head several times until blood began to stream out of it. Blood that I knew was LCL, but it looked like a real person's blood when you saw it wounded like that and it was sickening to watch.
The Angel kept attacking the EVA over and over until it looked like it was lifeless and beaten. I felt scared as I watched the video: my father had always told us the Evangelion units were invincible, that with the AT Field they were practically invulnerable to attack from anything, yet here was an EVA getting beaten to a pulp. I gulped in my throat, wondering if that unit had a pilot in it like Vance and I, just another kid like us.
Suddenly the purple EVA came to life, using its hands to grip the Angel and throw it towards the other side of the cityscape. The Evangelion was in a fearsome rage, roaring like a monster in the darkness as it then rushed towards the Angel in its own counter-attack. The two giants met each other in between tall buildings and this time the NERV unit got the better of the attack as it started to viciously beat it opponent. The EVA's attacks became increasingly more savage, mashing its opponent to a bloody mess. In all of our practice with our own Evangelion units both in simulations and in the underground arena, nothing we had done was anything like what was happening in the video.
Finally the purple EVA was victorious, basically mashing its opponent to pieces. As it seemed like the Angel would finally give out, it jumped and embraced the unit, then self-destructed. There was a massive wave of flame and smoke where the camera was mounted and you couldn't see the result for nearly a minute. Then the dark, lanky silhouette of the NERV unit could be seen over the cityscape. The unit had survived: beaten, bloody, but was still alive. The video then ended.
As I finished watching the screen I noticed that my breath was heavy, and I had to admit that I was terrified by what I had just seen. We had spent nearly a year in preparation to pilot EVA, and now with the actual units I had thought we were mastering the Evangelion's abilities to move and fight. But all of our simulated enemies were nothing like what I just saw on the video. That Angel had looked bizarre and twisted, alien or even demonic in appearance, and the way that it swiftly moved was nothing like the targets we were being trained to just shoot at. It moved fast, fought without any mercy, and only when the Japanese unit responded in kind did it managed to win the fight. I wiped the sweat from my forehead and gulped hard. Vance now turned to me.
"Erin," he said, "I don't know what your dad told you about these things, but that's REALLY what we're going to be doing out there." I couldn't say anything in reply, but I knew things had really changed for us. Vance stared right at me. "Do you think you can fight one of those things?"
I was nervous, as my hands started to shake. "Um…I guess so."
Vance leaned right into me. "Well, you're wrong."
He stood up and found a stool, and then dragged it to where my chair was. Then he sat down and we saw each other eye to eye. "You go out there, the way you are right now, and I can guarantee you're never coming back."
"That's not true!" I defended. "I've…I've got a good sync rate! And all of my combat result scores are high!"
"All that is worthless against the real thing."
"But maybe our EVAs are better than theirs," I defended. "Dad's not going to just put me out there to die!"
Vance was unimpressed. "Do you think you can kill something like that?" I wanted to just nod but something held me back. I hadn't realized quite what were really supposed to be doing until now. "I'll do what I have to do."
"So what do you think is easier? Killing rabbits or killing those things?"
"That's not a fair comparison. Those rabbits weren't monsters!"
"No, but they were prey. And to those Angels, we're the prey. That is, unless we fight back."
"What does that got to do with what you did yesterday?"
"It's because if you want to survive in the EVA you have to be able to kill just like that!" Vance snapped his fingers as he spoke. "You have to be like that guy in the video was: able to take so much damage and then still be able to bounce back and fight to the death, and it was a fight to the death."
"That's not the same thing…"
"It IS the same thing, It's exactly the same thing! Either you're the hunter or the hunted. There's no other way."
I was trembling now, afraid of what I had discovered. EVA wasn't just some sort of real-life game, there was a terrible reality to it and I was right in the middle of the hurricane. "Dad won't…dad won't let me down like that. He's put his whole life's work into the EVA, there's no way he'll let me lose!"
"You have to learn not to trust anyone but yourself," Vance coolly countered. "Not even me, only if you have the strength to do this are you going to survive."
Vance moved closer now, his expression softening. The peaceful look on his face that I had grown to love so much came back. "Erin, why do you pilot EVA? Why do you do it?"
Taking I deep breath, I replied "I'm…I'm born to this. I'm meant to be a pilot."
"If you had a choice, would you still chose it?"
"I…I don't know. I guess I'd rather be doing other things but, it's so much a part of my life now that I don't know what else I'd actually do."
He straightened up in the stool, calm and collected. "You see, Tiger, that's the difference between me and you. You didn't have any real choice in this, you're here because of family and all. But me…I chose this." I blinked at him, not quite understanding what he meant but Vance continued. "I chose to take this on. I got the chance and I knew I needed to be here and I…" he was going to speak further but one of his headaches, one of the bad ones he'd get from time to time came to him. Without thinking I got out of the chair and came to him, and as he crumbled to the stool in pain I put my hand on him, trying to comfort him in any way that I could. I didn't hate him at that moment. I couldn't, not after what had just happened.
I took a moment to break off and searched the ready room for a First Aid kit. Finding one I opened it and took out a pack of pain-killers and returned to Vance with a bottle of water. He took the pills as I watched, my arms around him. He just sat on the stool and closed his eyes, grimacing for another minute or so and then finally he appeared relieved. The light came back into his eyes.
"Sorry about that," he said softly. I just smiled at him, relieved to have the space between us closed again. "It's alright," I replied softly.
"Hey, your tiger missed you last night."
"I'm sorry I left him out there. I missed him too."
Vance didn't say anything else. Instead he took his arms and put them around me. His hands felt warm to the touch around my body and the effect was powerful. I wanted to melt. I just saw those dark brown eyes and his little smile and I just wanted to have all of that pain and loneliness go away. He brought me closer and then kissed me right there. I welcomed it and the kisses then became deeper. I felt his tongue and not quite knowing what else to do I just touched it with my own, but I liked the way that it felt.
His hold on me became tighter and I shifted to help him bring me onto the stool. In a minute I had my legs wrapped around his waist, the two of us kissing as we balanced and while my balance was good his wasn't so much and then we tumbled onto the floor.
The little accident had broken up our silence and we both laughed and giggled at what had happened. He smiled broadly at me and I smiled back, happy to have him back. I didn't know how I was going to handle what else was going on in our lives, but just for the moment I didn't want to be alone and neither did he. Right there on the floor he embraced me again and I did him, and our lips met each other again, and we skipped our training session and spent the whole afternoon making out on the ready room floor.
Everything else went perfectly that night, as while working with the EVA I had achieved the highest sync rate so far, a solid sixty-two percent. I went back home happy, my stuffed tiger in my arms, at least relieved that I had managed to get reconciled with Vance and also do so well with my unit. I drifted off to sleep with my tiger snuggled right next to me.
Again, another chapter that felt good in the writing. Erin is getting all sorts of clues about what is really going on but she's still too caught up in things to put it all together.
Some readers have asked me about how long of a trip am I planning here? I'd say this story expect to go on for about 15-20 chapters all told, and we'll try to post new chapters every 15 days. We have one more to go before we take a big jump in the storyline so please check in with us in a couple of weeks. Thanks.