Dual Plug Experiment #2 - Pilots Soryu and Ikari, Evangelion Unit 01
"So Shinji, how often have you been asked out?"
Rei looked at her, somehow managing to be reproving without any noticeable change in her expression.
Shinji rubbed the back of his head, "Umm. Does the training count? And do you want to know number of people or number of times?"
Asuka rolls her eyes, "No obviously the training doesn't count Shinji! For that I only asked you about what, not if."
"Err. I'm not actually sure."
Asuka laughs, "What, so many you lost count?"
"Huh? What? Why would anyone be interested in me? There were a few when they first learned I was a pilot, but Hikari put a stop to that. I don't even know who some of them were. Did you count all the letters you got in your locker?"
Asuka frowns, "Don't remind me."
"Other than Megumi and Chihiro? Which is either one, two or seven depending how you're counting. A couple maybe? One girl from 3C, she was even taller than you, it was a bit intimidating."
Asuka bursts out laughing, "I know you're a bit oblivious, but I didn't realise how much. Between Rei and Kaede's observations I've identified twenty five, and we're probably missing some."
"Is this one of Hikari's pranks? And who's Kaede?"
"No, Hikari refused to tell me, so of course then I actually needed to find out. And who's Kaede?" Asuka laughs, "She'd be devastated to hear that, apparently she runs your fan club. Small girl, long black hair. Not that that narrows it down around here."
"Oh, is that the girl you talked to at lunch yesterday? Hair long enough she can sit on it? That looked like it would be a lot of work, I know how much yours takes. She never asked, if that's what you're wondering. She's pretty though."
Asuka glares at Shinji, "An early start to your lessons, baka, you don't tell one girl that another girl is pretty."
Rei remarks into the ensuing silence, "I do not mind when he tells me you are beautiful."
Shinji and Asuka are intensely relieved when the elevator finally stops five minutes later, the walls really aren't that interesting no matter how long you stare at them.
Rei is sitting in 00 waiting for Unit 01's power-up test.
They haven't bothered testing the dual plugs in 00, the prototype is never going to have anyone but her in it. Not that there is any utility to her being there either. If something goes wrong, 00 isn't going to be able to do anything significant against a rampaging 01 with an S2 organ. She would only be useful if she could get to Shinji and Asuka in 01 herself. Explaining why in sufficient detail to change the protocol was not an acceptable option. So here she was.
At least synchronising with 00 no longer caused problems. No anger. No attempts to invade. No throwing itself at walls. No refusal to respond. Just a slight sense of disappointment that it was her. That had been stronger today, almost as if it had anticipated someone else, or someone with her. Perhaps her own sense of Shinji and Asuka did not carry over to 00. Or perhaps it did and it missed their physical presence the way she did.
It had actually been easier to communicate with Yui than with 00. At least Yui seemed to have some level of cognition, 00 seemed to be all emotions. Which she could not relate to. Except she had just recognised disappointment, anticipation and missing someone. Was her own growing emotional range affecting her understanding of 00? Given previous experiences, experimenting was not advisable. She would have plenty of time to think.
"Good afternoon Pfeffernüsse, nice of you to join us. I hope you like your brand new seat. I know you won't thank me for anything, but you should show some appreciation to Lieutenant Aoba and the technicians for having it ready for you overnight.
"We're going to power up just enough for Captain Ibuki to run her calibration tests before we start. We don't want to have gone to all this effort to make you comfortable unless the sensors work."
Asuka didn't know what to expect from the synchronisation attempt. Rei had been utterly unhelpful, the best she got was that it was unlikely to be the same. Which might mean that she wouldn't have a repeat of the painful feeling of separation and isolation that she still didn't want to think about the implications of. It somehow seemed unlikely that it would be the same random visualisation she got with her Eva.
She tried to relax. Which was actually a little easier than she imagined it would be under the circumstances. Whatever adjustments they'd made after Shinji's complaint were actually a significant improvement over her own plug. She leant back, the headrest supporting her like one of those ergonomic pillows she was convinced the Japanese didn't know existed.
Of course the other aspect of the dual plug was that she was effectively sitting between Shinji's legs. Technically it meant that she could tilt her head up and look at him. Technically. In practice that meant in order to actually see more than his feet she had to tilt her head quite far back, which resulted in her staring at his crotch with her mouth open. She had immediately switched to an inset video view of him. Not that she needed to see him at all, but if something happened to the personal synchronisation she'd at least be able to tell if he'd dissolved or something.
"Calibration complete. We'll start the synchronisation in thirty seconds."
Whatever it had been she was expecting, what she got was a total surprise. Instead of the chaotic visualisations she normally experienced, there was a brief moment of that visual noise and then a series of clear sharp images.
A man who looked like a younger version of her father smiling at a woman who must have been her mother who was holding a small child with a shock of red hair. That certainly wasn't from any picture she had ever seen.
A small boy with black hair and a wide smile. That could almost be a young Shinji, but I've never seen him smile like that. I wonder if our children would look like that. What the hell? I never want children! Why would I even think that?
An angry Asuka striding towards her, Rei perfectly in step beside her. Well, that's me but the angle is almost as if the camera was on the Eva's shoulder. I've never seen that expression on Rei's face either.
As the synchronisation deepened her sense of Shinji sitting behind her started to fade.
'No!' She'd had this fight before. She'd win it again if she had to. 'Mine!'
Unit 01 opened its eyes. Shinji opened her eyes. Asuka opened his eyes.
"Synchronisation stabilised at 142%," Aoba's tired voice came over the comm.
"Shinji, Asuka, how are you feeling?"
"Fine Captain,"
"Just a bit of double vision at the end of the synchronisation."
"Captain?"
"When did that happen?"
"Don't you pay attention to anything?"
"Children!" snapped Akagi. The simultaneous speaking was bad enough when they weren't arguing with themselves.
Ibuki's calmer voice followed, "Well, it was certainly less erratic than yesterday but you spiked to 180% and hit the limiters, so that might have had side effects. Don't worry, we'll keep an eye on you, and despite you doing that creepy speaking together thing again your psychographs are completely independent and not showing any contamination in any direction.
"We'll keep monitoring for a while and if all goes well we'll do the same movement tests as yesterday."
After the initial synchronisation, in which Asuka seemed to have a lot less problems with Yui than she had, things had been quiet.
Rei did not understand this longing to be held. She had gone fourteen years without it. Or ten. It depended on how you counted. It had been severe enough earlier that she had lost her sense of place. Even when she had lost her sense of time with Shinji for approximately an hour she had still known where she was. That word 'approximately' bothered her. She had recalibrated and it had been one hour and sixteen minutes. She had not experienced it though. The space between where she had been sitting and Asuka had been three point eight two metres. She had not experienced that either. It was disconcerting. At least she had not completely lost her anchors. She had always known where Shinji and Asuka were when that had happened.
What had Asuka called it? Sehnsucht. No, that might be how Asuka felt but she did not feel anything that strongly. There was a faint echo. Perhaps if 00 knew them, between them what they felt might add up to that. What a strange thought to have.
Rei nestled back in her seat and her sensation of Asuka.
"So tell me something interesting Maya."
Ibuki brings up the same visualisation as the day before.
"Yes, Sempai. The combined synchronisation rate is less stable than yesterday's, in the ten percent variability range, almost an order of magnitude higher.
"Asuka's rate is significantly lower than Ayanami's was, but that's not the interesting thing here.
"If you look at their deltas, Asuka and Shinji are within half a percent of each other. If they weren't different feeds with completely different wiring harnesses and with very different absolute rates I'd think we were only getting data from one of them."
"Anything show on your attractor?"
Ibuki grins, "Asuka and Shinji are all over the place, never in the same part of the attractor as each other or for more than a couple of seconds. That's very different. What's really interesting is this..." and she makes an adjustment.
Akagi sighs, "I assume you are about to explain why making Shinji and Asuka's points alternately disappear holds some significance other than data loss?"
"They aren't disappearing. I time-shifted Ayanami's data by approximately half a second. They aren't being lost, they are being occluded - Ayanami is hitting almost exactly the same points with a time delay. That shouldn't even be possible with an attractor like this."
"You said 'approximately'?"
"Yes. The data points are the same, but the time differential varies slightly. I haven't worked out if there's a pattern to it yet though."
Akagi frowns at the data, Hyuga hands her a cup of coffee, most of which has long since gone cold before she looks up again.