Creation began on 03-28-20

Creation ended on 02-15-21

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Eva Art Online: Race to the Finish

A/N: Now that the situation has changed, things are going to escalate.

Two days since the discovery of this challenge laid out by the late Etheria Nogareru…and the remaining multitude of players, men, women, children, trapped within Survival Times were trying to win the first trial to obtain the first key to reach the egg she hid within the game. A race that required speed and maneuverability, it wasn't easy to achieve due to the dangers that were part of the roads on the massive track. In addition, there were limitations to the requirements to participate in the first trial. Because the race was ground-based, none of the players trapped could use vehicles or equipment that enabled flight; nobody could achieve success with a plane or hang glider. Cars, bikes, rollerblades, even animals that relied on their legs to get around were permitted, but nothing else beyond them.

This is what led Shinji, Kensuke and Mari to a place in one of the realms of the game to get their requirements to participate in the trial. Each member of the trio had been in contact with a contact of Mari's still alive in the game that specialized in the manufacturing of vehicles associated with the Street Race Realm, a neighboring realm to the Modernity Realm, relating to people's love of driving fast and reckless.

"Damn, this truck is a tank," Kensuke expressed as he examined his vehicle, a modified 2005 Oshkosh Defense Medium Tactical truck with military camouflage.

"Yeah, I figured you'd like a military vehicle that could endure and cover a great distance," said Mari's contact, Hondo Tanker, avatar name 00-Wheels, an American who in the real world knew enough about cars to build them as accurately in a virtual world. "Just remember not to accelerate too much or you'll burn the engine with the nitrous oxide demands."

Mari and Shinji, on the other hand, had taken to using smaller cars over larger vehicles; smaller, lighter cars could move faster than their heavier counterparts. But like Kensuke, their car choices differed based on their tastes; Mari had chosen a purple Toyota Prius while Shinji had a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution with a blue trim on its silver chassis and decorated with a masked samurai on the passenger side door and a depiction of Kazuma the Shell Bullet on the driver's side door.

"Thank you, Hondo," Mari praised her contact.

"Don't mention it," he responded; he'd been among the various players trapped in the game to have an overload of commissions to build vehicles for those that had no means of transportation. "Just try to win the contest for those of us that want to get out of this game alive. One of you three, please. I'd rather be back home with my grandmother than stuck in a game."

Shinji nodded in the positive and got into his car.

"Let's go study the first trial," he told Kensuke and Mari, turning the key and hearing the engine roar to life. "There has to be more to the race than what we can see."

-x-

"…Now, it's some kind of quest for those trapped in the game to find an Easter egg?" Gendo questioned Ritsuko as the latter recently discovered a hidden section of code in the game that revealed a message that served as a twisted form of a last will and testament.

"Yes," she answered him. "Miss Nogareru left behind a substantial sum prior to her death, but she didn't name any beneficiaries. Not in the traditional sense. So, she created this contest to test those trapped in Survival Times to select a beneficiary to her fortune. Whoever wins the contest will also receive her admin status within the game, which will enable them to log out everyone still alive in the game."

"This will undoubtedly excite the masses that feel desperate. How many players have risen to the challenge after it was revealed?"

"Of the remaining players, including the Second and Third Children, four-thousand-sixty-seven, but the first trial is difficult to pass."

"How so?"

"It's based on a race…and there's a gap near the end of the track. It takes place in the Modernity Realm, which is based on cities in the real world, and only ground-based vehicles and ridable animals are permitted in the race. Cars, tanks, bikes, horses, whatever has wheels and/or can be mounted and move on the ground. But the major problem is the gap at the end."

"What is this gap?"

"A boss monster that impedes whoever tries to get past it, like a boss villain in any game level."

-x-

The only good thing about this trial that players found helpful was that nobody could actually die if something happened to them, but losing the first challenge still held consequences for whoever got injured. They lost a significant portion of their avatar health and items, reducing their current levels and equipment, but only if they got smashed by something or fell off the bridges or was ran over by other players. Those that managed to avoid these repercussions still retained their current levels and equipment, but found getting through the race problematic due to the boss that stood in their way to the finish line. This is what left Shinji, Kensuke and Mari faced with trying to get to the first key they needed.

"The only benefit to this trial is that we can take it over and over again every fifteen minutes," Mari sighed as they sat on a hill that overlooked the starting point of the race track; they had gone through the race five times now, slowly studying the layout and dangers, narrowly evading getting mauled by a hulking werewolf the size of a house. "But how are we going to get passed Godzilla? He's the King of the Monsters. Nothing gets past him."

"I know," Kensuke added. "Even if we avoid his arms, there's that tail of his. He doesn't even have to use his Atomic Breath to zero us out."

"And we can't use the other players as a distraction, either," Shinji finished. "He blocks every opening to get through. But there has to be a way to win the first key. Otherwise, what is the point of this contest? A pipe dream? False hope?"

"I don't need any more false hope," Mari expressed. "I just need one shred of hope that we'll make it out of here alive."

Beep! They heard the signal of another race challenge begin.

Kensuke opened his menu and selected an item in the shape of a portable television set, displaying the race in front of them.

"Maybe one of them will get lucky," he told Shinji and Mari.

"Maybe," Shinji accepted, "but they gotta get past Godzilla."

"Say, check that one out," Mari pointed to one of the participants, "the one on the bike."

"Yeah, it's modeled after Kaneda's bike from Akira, right down to the framework, except that it's black and purple. I think…" Kensuke was explaining.

"Not the bike itself," Mari cut him off. "The rider. I think that's the player people call The D3m0n3ss (Demoness)."

"The D3m0n3ss? The Lady Badass? The Chick that Hits more than she Splits?"

"I've seen her combat videos," Shinji told them. "She's the Queen of Mortal Kombat and Killer Instinct. But there's almost nothing about who she is IRL. Part of the reason we use online videogames is to avoid meeting in real life."

They observed as the player rode past the other cars and evading the werewolf as it tore through eight of them. The D3m0n3ss was very skilled with the bike, almost as though she had been training around motorcycles before she tried her hand at virtual biking. But as the race reached its climax, Shinji saw how twenty cars and three horses get wiped away by Godzilla's tail, and the biker player slowed down eight feet away from where the King of the Monsters was crouched down, waiting for the next victim. If she was looking for an alternate route, it wasn't anywhere they were looking.

"This race is over," Shinji sighed as The D3m0n3ss turned away. "Based on what we've seen thus far, we can get past the werewolf and other obstacles, but Godzilla is the wall we can't get through or past. Anyone that thinks there's an opening is prevented by his claws, head and tail. He's like an impenetrable fortress. Unbeatable."

"An unstoppable force," Mari agreed with him. "But there's gotta be a way. Why else do this?"

"It'll be another fifteen minutes until the race restarts," Kensuke reminded. "I'll try and get some information from the participants and see if they had any ideas."

"I'll head back to Hondo's shop and see if he's been asked to boost the speed of his clients," she responded. "Shinji?"

But Shinji continued to look at the racetrack as it regenerated. If they couldn't retrieve the keys and find the egg, they'd have to fall back on the original plan and make it to the last level of the one-hundred-level long quest to escape, and that meant risking their very lives. He didn't want them to die, but he didn't want to give up when there had to be a way to beat the first challenge. The King of the Monsters might've been representative as an unbeatable villainous NPC, Shinji had admired the guy as being heroic when in films that portrayed him as such. The first film he ever saw of his was when he was facing his mechanical doppelgänger made by the aliens.

"I was just thinking of the time I saw my first Godzilla film," he told them. "He was fighting Mechagodzilla and was partnered with King Caesar. He was heroic, saving the world."

"Yeah," Kensuke and Mari agreed with him.

"Even in the original film, he wasn't so much a villain as he was a victim," Mari informed. "He was exposed to H-bomb and left him in pain, and he attacked and left Tokyo in ruins as punishment for mankind's arrogance and lack of respect towards nature. Being a monster, the filmmakers can take Godzilla wherever they choose, making him a hero or villain, backwards and forwards."

"I don't like it when they take it backwards," Kensuke expressed.

Then…Shinji sighed as he got up.

"I'm going to try something in the next race," he revealed to them.

"Do you see a way to get around Godzilla?" Mari asked him.

"I don't think there is a way that we can see, but I gotta try something. If anyone's gotta take a risk, it should be me. If my idea falls through, then at least we know what not to do."

"Are you sure you want to do this, Shinji?" Kensuke asked.

"Yeah."

"Good luck."

-x-

"…It doesn't seem like anyone is able to beat the first challenge," Misato stated to Kaji over the phone as she monitored the status of the Second and Third Children within the game. "The challenge is forcing everyone participating in it to level down every time they face a boss that defeats them."

"It gets worse over here, Katsuragi," her old boyfriend. "Asuka's parents, her stepmother in particular, had considered pulling the plug on her because they didn't want to wait on her to wake from a game-induced coma. They almost did it until I spoke up on her behalf. They were just going to kill her while she was still alive and unable to make herself heard."

"Well, isn't Germany also severing its ties with NERV because one of their pilots got incapacitated from a videogame?"

"They're considering it, but I can't let them pull the plug on Asuka just because she's stuck in a game right now. Who chooses to give up on someone that isn't even brain-dead?"

Misato had to consider that only people with very little patience and even less heart had such a capacity to do what Asuka's parents had attempted to do. She rarely went to see Shinji, but got the impression that not even his father had gone to see him after finding out that he'd been incapacitated, as well. If she had to suggest it, it was possible that the Second and Third Children were better off trapped in a virtual world where they could do just about anything they wanted rather than being in the real world where all their problems were; a boy that came from a broken home and family and a girl that was just broken, inside and outside, were barely on anyone's list of priorities. At least not emotionally.

"They're not dead," she sighed, "but given the situation we're all facing every time, they might as well be dead. The Third Child spent most of his time playing the game because he didn't have anyone in his real life to be with…and his aunt and uncle might've been abusing him."

"Yeah, I've been reading your report. His injuries are inconsistent with a slip and fall. Even if he had been sitting down when this all happened, he wouldn't have gotten injuries like his. The question, though, would be why they were abusing him."

"It's pretty moot at this point; he can't tell us anything if he's incapacitated and they won't say anything, either. Still, it would make plenty of sense for someone like him to create a fantasy life in a game to replace the lack of a life out here where there's not much of anything for him to grounded to. At least in the game, people like him don't have to think about anyone that may not be waiting for him to come back at all."

-x-

The next race was set to begin, and Shinji was at the end of the horde of vehicles and animals belonging to other players that were participating.

"Be careful out there, Shinji," Mari told him over their communication channel, as he placed his hands on the steering wheel. "Don't throw your life away."

"Yeah," he responded, seeing the lights change to get the players to pay attention. "Here goes."

When the lights were green and the signal was given, everyone dashed off. Well, everyone else but Shinji, whose car hadn't moved an inch from where he had started. He had been left alone at the starting point.

"Uh, Shinji?" Kensuke questioned. "You haven't moved."

"I'm about to," he told him, and started driving.

But the way he was had surprised his two companions. He had turned his car around and was going the other way, straight towards the wall that kept the players from going anywhere else on the road. This was his move, and this was his risk.

"Shinji, no!" Mari yelled at him, but he accelerated towards the wall. "Please! Don't do it!"

But his decision was already made, and he couldn't back out now. Five seconds remained before he collided. Four…three…two…

Crap, he thought as he closed his eyes.

Suddenly, the wall in front of the car split open like a flower blossoming…and the car had driven onto a road that appeared unfinished and cluttered with oversized crates and construction vehicles that were being moved on large lifting platforms!

"Shinji!" He heard Kensuke's voice as he opened his eyes to see the road in front of him curve to his left. "You're not going to believe this, but you're already in first place in the race! Your tracking progress says you're ahead of everyone else, but…you're not on the path they took!"

Looking above his car, Shinji saw a glass road showcasing his opponents in the race, either crashing or getting slammed by the werewolf or other obstacles. It was amazing. It was amazing; he was seeing everything…and yet he was just driving along this alternate path just below the other competitors that didn't know he was there. And he was now on the way to victory in this race to get the first key.

"You're heading towards the king now, Shinji," Mari informed him as he saw Godzilla above him. "Oh, man!"

Godzilla looked down…and it was as though he could see Shinji below the path.

"Grr," he growled as Shinji drove past him and towards a ramp that opened up in front of his car.

"Time to win this," Shinji uttered, hitting a button on his wheel, activating his nitrous oxide intake for his engine. "Aaaurgh!"

He jumped onto the ramp and drove up to the surface of the road and past Godzilla, who roared in contempt over being passed by. His car drove under a sign that read, "Finish Line", and stopped by a large Taoist fountain on the ground. An orchestra of musical instruments played and Etheria's digital avatar appeared in front of Shinji as he got out of his car.

"That was excellent racing strategy for someone looking for a different route to bypass all opposition," she greeted him with praise. "Congratulations."

And then, she raised her right hand up, producing a key with a base shaped like the letter "A" within an "O", and it floated to Shinji's avatar.

"The Alpha Key," she revealed, and he accepted it. "Get yourself a clue, young man."

He felt a slight surge in his nape and his menu popped up in front of him, revealing a message and the Alpha Key in his inventory.

-x-

Gendo had been informed that the Third Child had completed the first of three trials in this contest left by the Nogareru woman that died before the game was distributed, and he was wondering how his son managed to do so when everyone else had difficulty. And then, there was his avatar name, Ronin-2004; he had used the year he lost Yui and had been left in the care of his aunt and uncle, and he decided to view himself as a ronin, a samurai without a master to serve. If anything, the name had been symbolic to his situation; Shinji had nobody to commit to and that year was when his life took a turn.

"Do you think he'll win?" He was asked by Fuyutsuki.

"I can't concern myself with events that have no place in the real world," he told him.

"You do realize that if he does, he still won't know why he's here or what you want him to do, and by that time, it's likely that he'll refuse and walk away."

"He will not walk away."

But Gendo had no guarantee on such a belief. There was no luck on the boy making a speedy recovery and getting into the Eva. Anyone that has been in a coma for any extended time periods would require some physical therapy to regain control of their limbs properly, and they would have to be on some medication to help them stay alive, such as intravenous fluids to replace food. It would've taken weeks or even months to recover, even with NERV's resources.

"He's not the only one that has the first key," Fuyutsuki stated, which was also a truth; shortly after Shinji had obtained the first key, two other players, one AK-4700 and one Shiori-1999, presumably the two people that were with the Third Child.

-x-

It was best to stay away from those too desperate for those who would have gone to incredible lengths just to win, so Shinji, Mari and Kensuke didn't broadcast their obtain of the Alpha Key. Not that it made a difference when there were multiple scoreboards floating around different levels of different game realms to tell the people who possessed the first key and their victory stats. But it wasn't the only thing that was known to the people; for some reason, after obtaining the key, Shinji's monetary account had an increase of two-hundred-thousand coins to buy things within the game world they were in.

Kensuke and Mari had gotten less than Shinji due to coming in second and third place, resulting in respective increases of one-hundred-thousand and fifty-thousand. And so Kensuke suggested that they go to this location in the game where the players could upgrade their gear or avatars.

"It must be one of the benefits of having the key," said Mari as they walked into the place known best as Outfit Dominions. "I wish I could feel like I'm soiling my pants right now. What to get from here?"

"Hey, check this item out here," said Kensuke as he pointed to an object that was floating around in a display case. "This is the first time I've ever seen a Doomsday Bomb."

"Yeah, but the price is more than any of us have right now," Mari reminded him, checking the price for such an item that had only a one-time usage. "Just how powerful is it?"

"Powerful," Shinji told her. "Once triggered, it kills everyone the radius it develops the playing field in, which is the size of an entire country, including the person that uses it."

"Who would want it?"

"Loonies. If they want it, they'll pay the price for it."

They walked away from the object that resembled a regular bomb that was usually seen in the old films that showed bombs. There were various types of items here that were either beneficial to multiple players no matter what their avatar type was or were limited to just that particular type of avatar. There were swords with special powers, guns with special targeting systems, attack and defense items that took the form of creatures associated to whatever realm they belonged to, even inventory expansion cases. This was where Shinji came once to expand his inventory slot on his menu to fifteen-hundred items.

"So, what should we get?" Kensuke asked them as he saw something he liked. "I'm getting me a Holy Rifle."

"I've been meaning to augment my naginata," Mari stated. "Shinji?"

"I'm updating my skill set above all," he told them.

To be continued…

A/N: Expect the next chapter to have a sign of merciful attitude towards Asuka by Shinji, but not that much.