CW for prescription drug misuse in this chapter
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Chapter 9
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There was a soft, low beeping, and dull red light. Slowly, Asuka opened her eyes.
Her HUD was entirely dark, but for a small notification box: Fuel at 28.9%. Reactor output level 4 - 3.32 years to shutdown. Current power level sufficient for entry plug systems and life support ONLY. The red glow was from the entry plug's emergency light; its main light looked undamaged, but was either nonfunctional or shut down to conserve power.
A throbbing headache pulsed through her skull, and ghost pains burned in her shoulder. Her stomach and left leg just felt eerily numb, and when she looked down - with some difficulty - she could see burned circuitry through the damaged surface of the plugsuit.
Asuka slumped back against the seat, half- closing her eyes. The LCL - despite its oxygen content - felt uncomfortably thick around her, turning the act of drawing breath into a painful and arduous effort; the nerve injuries on her torso definitely didn't help in that regard.
She gathered her hazy focus, bringing her mind to bear on the interface. Slowly, the rest of the entry plug system booted up.
Synchronicity capped at 10% while in low power mode. Entry plug interface active.
EVA-UNIT02 is CRITICALLY DAMAGED. Full activation is not recommended.
Rolling her eyes at the warning, Asuka brought up the evangelion's internal memory. She fast-forwarded through the mission until she found the frame where Unit 02's hands were around the angel's core. Playing it back in slow motion, she saw the red crystal shatter in the Eva's grip and the shards burst into brilliant white light.
Then the recording abruptly terminated, returning her to the dark visual display.
"Kill confirmed," Asuka idly remarked, her voice rough. Verdammt… I never knew it was possible to knock an evangelion unconscious.
She raised her good arm, pressing the heel of her palm against her forehead. Stress headache shouldn't be long now. She blinked, looking over the HUD information, and something caught her eye.
Comm Status: Inactive
Asuka blinked, starting a communication suite diagnostic with a mental gesture.
Command Level Telecom extensions: inoperable - unknown hardware failure
Evangelion Telecom suite: operable - inactive
Asuka muttered a curse, silently blaming the depth pressure of the abyssal plain for the hardware failure in her extensions. She took a deep breath, then powered up the standard comm.
"To anyone listening: this is evangelion unit two, callsign Moloch. I need recovery ASAP. Message repeats."
She looped the message and set to broadcast on all UN channels. Then, exhausted, she let go of the control sync and slumped against the chair. She could barely summon the energy to undo the seatbelt.
If it even allows me to eject the entry plug at this depth, the pressure would crush me like an egg in a hydraulic press. I'm stuck here until I get recovered - which is a bit of a toss-up, given that the distress signal will never reach the surface - or I die. Asuka sighed softly. Three years of power in life support mode. I know LCL hydrates us; is it also capable of providing basic nutrition, or will I just starve to death after forty days?
Well, I suppose I always expected to die in the entry plug of a wrecked evangelion. Not from starvation, but war has many occupational hazards to choose from…
With the link circuit closed down, exhaustion and neurotransmitter depletion abruptly caught up with her. Asuka was asleep the moment her eyes slid shut.
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Rei had been told that when they exited the decontamination process, the pilots should proceed to debriefing. However, the briefing room was empty when they arrived.
"Misato should be here, shouldn't she?" Shinji frowned. "This… this is the right room for debriefing, right?"
"Misato is likely in the control room, Ikari," came Rei's soft reply.
Shinji turned, surprised she had spoken. "Really…? But she said she'd be here. Why would she be in the control room?"
Rei tilted her head by a fraction of a degree. "The hallway lighting indicates a red alert is in effect. It is likely that an angel attack is underway."
The color drained from Shinji's face. "An… an angel? Why didn't we get the call?!"
"We were already on deployment," Rei replied shortly, striding back over to the briefing room door.
"But - but an angel's more important than a malfunctioning robot!"
"The time and effort involved in extraction and redeployment would likely have been counterproductive," Rei droned back. "It seems possible that the remaining ops staff may have elected to deploy pilot Soryu alone."
"What?!" Shinji seemed aghast. "Deploying a pilot with no backup - didn't they learn anything from when I fought the first angel?"
The third angel, she mentally corrected, but decided against vocalizing the thought. "Pilot Soryu is demonstrably more capable than either of us, Ikari."
Shinji's shoulders slumped. "I can't argue with that," he muttered. "Still, better doesn't mean she's invincible."
Rei was taken aback at the statement, and actually slowed her pace slightly.
Obviously, Soryu is not exempt from physical harm. But her fearless demeanor suggests no concern for that fact - if she could render herself invulnerable by force of determination alone, she would certainly do so.
An alien feeling made itself known, crawling down her spine and settling uncomfortably in the pit of her stomach.
If she is deployed alone, there is a greater risk that she may be hurt or killed. She is not replaceable.
"Ayanami?" Shinji cocked his head. "Are… you okay?"
Rei did not blink, but the jolt to her sense as she brought her eyes back into focus was an appropriate facsimile. She realized her hurried strides had slowed to a slow walk, and Shinji was now in front of her.
She gathered her focus, shifting her breathing back to a steady pattern and pushing the increasingly troublesome distraction from her mind. Her walking pace increased until she exactly matched her previous stride.
"Huh? Okay, don't answer, I guess - hey, wait up!"
It took only a few short minutes for them to reach the Ops Center. What greeted them there was a somewhat unusual sight.
The control room was quiet. The occasional auxiliary staffer murmured a quiet update, but otherwise a tense hush permeated the air. Aoba seemed to have relaxed and leaned back, lacking any substantial involvement in the current operation; Maya and Misato both had their eyes glued to the big screen's satellite view. Hyuga was tapping away at his workstation.
"Did someone mess with my settings?" The lieutenant called suspiciously.
"If yes, blame Asuka," Maya said back, not diverting her attention.
Silence reigned once more. Then, abruptly, a comm window appeared on the screen - at first showing only static and 'connecting…' but rapidly resolving into a grey slate with the words EVA-UNIT05: BAAL across the top and sound only across the center.
"No sign of her on the first dive. I think her aquatic combat gear was compromised; I'm gonna have to go deeper. Preparing to dive in ten."
"Belay that," Misato barked. "This is Ops Director Katsuragi speaking. Report, pilot."
"Misato?!" Mari sounded surprised. "I was told you were out of town, ma'am. Pilot Soryu took command of the defense -"
"I've been briefed on the situation." Misato's voice was like steel. "Report, pilot."
"Yes, ma'am!" One could almost hear her voice snapping to attention. "I lost communication with Moloch approximately an hour ago - the angel dragged her down and she wouldn't let go of the harpoon line. Ten minutes or so after I lost them, there was an upheaval indicating a massive undersea explosion."
"An undersea explosion," Misato repeated. "One of the angels we've faced exploded violently when it was destroyed."
"You think she successfully took down the angel alone?" Maya seemed skeptical. "That angel was as colossal as it was powerful."
"Moloch wasn't armed with nuclear weaponry. If there was a massive deep-sea explosion, there are only two possibilities," Misato said - her voice meticulously calm. "Either the angel exploded when she destroyed it… or, Asuka triggered Moloch's explosive self-destruct."
The command crew fell quiet, with naught but the murmured background noise of the auxiliary staff to disturb the brittle silence.
This body is 10.53 years old and its heart has beat 443,273,518 times.
But the tick of her heartbeat no longer brought the comforting quiet to Rei's mind. Instead, her heart thumped loudly in her ears, each pulse belting across her senses like the report of a firing howitzer.
Pilot Soryu may have triggered Moloch's self-destruct.
Mari's comm crackled again - this time, with a strained, nervous voice. "You… really think she'd do that? Suicide bomb?"
"If she thought it was the only option?" The faintest hint of a tremor brushed the captain's voice on the last syllable. "I don't even think she'd hesitate, if she was sure."
Pilot Soryu may have triggered Moloch's self-destruct.
The thought wouldn't leave her mind, for all the meagre effort she could spare to try. Visions of Moloch grappling a huge beast in the lightless depths and exploding into a fireball the size of an N2 burst flickered through her imagination.
It should have been me. Rei felt shaken and sick - in fact, the sensation reminded her of the last time she'd suffered a concussion, only without the physical pain. It should have been me. I should have been the one to die alone in the darkness. Pilot Soryu's uniqueness should not have been lost, not when my pale mimicry could have been destroyed instead.
"Based on location tracker data, the area that Moloch or… any remains could have ended up…" Misato's composure was cracking, as she struggled to face the possibility that one of her adopted children might be KIA. "It isn't large. A few DSV's could scan the area pretty quickly, but we don't have any on hand at New Yokosuka, and it'd take time to bring them in from further out…"
"Captain, requesting permission to dive again." Mari composed herself. "An Eva can take any depth - well, maybe not the really deep trenches, but it can take the abyssal plain - and I'm here right now. I won't - I can't give up on her until I see the wreckage myself."
"What's your fuel situation, Baal?" Misato managed, looking away from the screen.
"Down to about a third. Ninety hours or thereabouts, if I stick to output level three. Plenty of time to get down there, check around and get back up again."
"Permission granted."
Rei felt the tension subside slightly.
She is missing in action, not confirmed KIA. Whatever her fate, I will know soon. She may yet live.
As one, the command crew turned back to their stations. The red alert light above the big screen turned yellow.
"Going off comms for a deep dive. If I'm not back up within 12 hours, then the angel got me. Ciao." Mari's comm window disappeared.
This body is 10.53 years old and its heart has beat 443,273,659 times.
Not once had Rei broken her calm and collected demeanor. However, the turmoil would not leave her mind no matter how hard she focused.
I have not yet lost function. But this… defect is clearly beyond control by mental discipline alone - I will have to take stronger measures.
"So, we'll know by tomorrow morning…" Misato murmured, turning to Rei and Shinji. "I'd suggest you two go home and catch some sleep. We still don't know the threat level here, and you two need to be as rested as possible if we still need to fight an angel."
"Yes," Rei answered, her voice as neutral as ever. As she turned to leave, however, Shinji spoke.
"Do we have to?" He insisted. "I want to be here when she gets back."
An irrational urge, to turn and join Shinji in his insistence to stay, seized hold of Rei - but she bit it back as quickly as it came.
Nothing good will come of lingering here, and the captain has given us orders.
The ops center door closed behind her, and she heard nothing more.
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Her apartment was empty as ever, and the evening air was still - the demolitions crews would have turned in for the night some time ago. Rei's feet trod the same scuffed footprint path in the dust as hundreds of times before.
Her usual schedule had been somewhat thrown off, but that was only to be expected when duty called. NERV often needed her on short notice, and she existed only to obey NERV's - the commander's - orders.
On a normal day, she would have taken her medications twenty-eight minutes ago. She had, however, long ago grown used to minor disruptions in that routine.
She walked over to her dresser and opened the bottles, counting out one dose of each. When she had finished, she reached for the beaker of water -
- And stopped.
Doctor Akagi has told me that a side effect of this medication regimen is a limited capacity for emotional responses or emotional memory. It reduces my ability to feel.
An image of Asuka's determined face filled her mind's eye. Then the imaginary but haunting image of Moloch exploding in the deep ocean -
Clearly, this side effect can be useful. It should help curb this unwanted fixation, if I increase my dose.
She carefully counted out the pills once more, doubling the already unnerving pile of drugs, and retrieved a syringe and the bottle of LCL.
Then, finally, she reached for the beaker of water.
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It was some hours before dawn when the comm crackled again. Maya and Ritsuko - the only NERV staff that regularly worked into the wee hours - immediately turned their attention back to the big screen.
The satellite view told them all they needed to know, even before the comm link had finished connecting.
"I've got her! She's alive!"
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The minute Mari staggered out of the entry plug in the recovery bay, she was limping across the catwalk to where a large medical team and the bulk of the recovery crews were swarming around the much more severely damaged red evangelion.
"M- Miss! Pilot Illustrious! I need to check you over; you shouldn't strain yourself -"
Mari pivoted on her heel - momentarily swaying and struggling to keep her balance - and glared at the woman who was trailing behind her. "My sister just got chewed up by an angel and then KO'd by a nuke-sized explosion. Don't tell me not to strain myself."
The other woman's expression softened, but she didn't back off. "Pilot Soryu is already in the hands of the best medical staff NERV-J can offer. Sen- I mean, Doctor Akagi will be personally overseeing her treatment." She folded her arms. "Now please, try not to be a stubborn soldier for a few minutes, and accompany me to D wing before I have to carry you."
Mari raised her eyebrow, looking the remarkably small woman up and down and mentally comparing her to her own, substantially larger frame. "I don't think you could carry me, shorty, even if I didn't put up a fight."
The woman's eyes narrowed. "First of all, that's first lieutenant Ibuki Maya to you, warrant officer. Second, are you really claiming you could put up much of a fight with sleep deprivation, acute synchronicity feedback shock, a pronounced limp, and what appears to be a paralyzed arm?" Maya smirked. "I'd be amazed if you managed a limp slap before you passed out on the floor. Third, you might be a difficult carry, but I have no doubt that I could drag you there."
The english pilot opened her mouth and raised a finger, but before she could speak, Maya cut over her again. "Also, in the time I've held you up here, the EMT's have already taken Asuka to D wing. So if you want to make sure she's okay, you might as well follow me anyway."
Mari made a face. "Ugh, you're good. I think I hate you now."
"Well, I'm paid to keep you and your war machines alive and ticking smoothly, not to be nice to you while I do it." Maya grabbed Mari's paralyzed hand. "Now, you can follow me or I can make good on my threat of dragging you. Your choice."
Without waiting for an answer, the lieutenant began walking - not too quickly to make it difficult to keep up, but with a strong step and posture to it. Mari was almost yanked off balance, and she stumbled, but managed to catch herself before she fell.
"You're cruel," she mumbled. "I'd be so mad at you if you weren't cute."
"I'm not cruel, I've just been awake for twenty-three hours and on shift for twenty-two of them." Maya appeared to entirely ignore the flirt. "Now, Asuka is still unconscious, but I'll let you look in on her if you manage to stay standing that long. Does that work for you?"
"Not like I have much choice, is it?" Mari managed a tired smile. "Lead the way, lieutenant Ibuki."
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