Creation began on 03-16-24
Creation ended on 08-20-24
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Welcome to your Escape: Love is also a Battlefield
There was something about Zi that made it the best place for people from Earth to relocate for a better life. Besides the fact that it was a larger planet than Earth and was not environmentally devastated by Second Impact or any other meteorites, Zi held a special place in the hearts of humans who learned of the existence of life beyond the Earth and had established this relationship that kept both races from trying to end one another. Although humans still on Earth tended to wage wars against each other in excess every now and then, Zi was off limits to the ravages of warfare and Earth's petty conflicts.
"…And with the Royal Cup just two weeks away," Shinji hears a man say on a radio inside the supermarket he was in, "people all over Zi are looking forward to seeing the best teams compete against one another for the glory and title of Class "S". All the legends, the heavy hitters, the underdogs and the Cinderella stories, all itching to make their mark in the history of the Zoids tournament and become a new generation of heroes. It's so exciting, even I can barely contain my restraint."
Shinji picks up a can of tuna on the shelf and reads the label to check the contents.
"It's getting to the point where it feels like people from Earth are bringing their paranoia with them to Zi," he hears a girl say, and he looks up at a young woman looking at a different can of food across from him.
"It's a habit," he replies. "People just want to make sure they eat right."
"But which way is the right way? Nobody here responsible for food production is from Earth. Everyone that eats here is the same as they were before people from Earth made strives to make a life here. The only thing that makes life here a challenge for anyone is whatever the problems they wanted to get away from."
She was around his age, with long, brownish hair and gray eyes, a pale complexion and wearing a black and blue dress.
"I saw your first match as a part of the Clover Team," she tells him. "You're Shinji Ikari, pilot of the Liger Rogue, aren't you?"
"Uh, yeah. Yeah."
"You were very impressive. That girl, Nico, picked right when she chose you. It's just awful that your father is trying to be your foe and compete in the Royal Cup to spite you."
"Well, I can't let him have his way."
"Neither can my team."
"Your team?"
"Rumiko Gaidoku of the Excalibur Team."
"Rumiko Gaidoku? Some would view a meeting between people from two Zoid teams as intimidation, and I already intimidated my father with my team."
"Not you, Mr. Ikari. We're both heading for the Royal Cup. It's all a matter of who wants it more. Who wants to win the most and why they want to win."
"Who wants to win the most…and why. Why does anyone picked to be part of a Zoid team want to win? For money? For fame? To be free from the criticisms of those that think they know how you're going to turn out when they don't even know who you are deep down? To inspire others to believe in themselves and achieve their own dreams?"
"All of the above. They each matter to those who have those goals in mind. I look forward to seeing you in the Royal Cup. All I ask from you is this one thing: Don't lose to your old man before we meet on the battlefield. I read your profile…and I want to see for myself if you're as good as the vid posts show you to be in that Zoid of yours. Heh. I'm looking forward to seeing you again, Shinji Ikari."
As she turned and pushed her shopping cart away, Shinji was left…mesmerized by this girl. But despite being intrigued by her, he was also bothered with her interest in him. Was she really a member of a Zoid team? Or was she a…a pawn by his father in a ploy to mess with him?
I better look her up, he thought, hoping that Rumiko was just some girl unaffiliated with his father or NERV. She's quite pretty.
He resumed his task of shopping for food for the Clover Team; since he drew the short straw, he had to restock the hangar's pantry, something Geisha actually believed to be a simple job.
-x-
"Ahh…ahh…ahh," Gendo grunted as he was lifting weights in the gym assigned to the soloists competing in the Royal Cup. Who do these people think they are?
He was referring to the mother of Nico Megumi, Faye Megumi, who paid him a visit just a few days ago, to remind him that while he was assured his right to compete in the tournament, he still had to follow the rules if he wanted to win it.
"…The Death Stinger is a powerful Zoid, but this isn't a war or a vendetta for everyone that's going to compete," Faye had informed him. "It's a game where the stakes are high and reaching Class "S" is more than just a shot at a king's ransom and celebrity status. It's a shot at a new life for those looking to get out of the shadows of wherever it is that they currently stand and move on with more alternatives to choose from. Some of the competitors want to win for their loved ones, some because they want to make their own lives easier, others because they want to be more than what some people think they have to settle for. Now, your reason for competing, to be better than all else, can be interpreted in many ways, so I will only say this to you: You may not demonstrate that you have a vendetta due to my daughter choosing your son and enabling him to turn against you because you had an immoral motive for wanting him to go to this Tokyo-3 to see you, but don't try to rig the tournament in your favor simply because you're a competitor. You cross one line on the battlefield, just one line, regardless of your intentions, and you can kiss your chances of victory goodbye."
It was ridiculous to think that he needed to be reminded not to do things he knew would be the end of his brief career as a Zoid pilot. But the only reason he was doing any of this was to keep the Third Child from winning the Royal Cup. No, to keep Shinji from winning; neither one of them were affiliated with NERV, so such designations were no longer valid in this case on an alien planet similar to Earth on the other side of the Milky Way. If he couldn't achieve his personal goals, he was going to make sure that Shinji couldn't achieve any of his, either.
One way or another, he thought as he switched from lifting weights to running on a treadmill, I will ruin your life like how you ruined my goals, Shinji.
-x-
"…Yeah, this is her, Shinji," says Valerie to Shinji as they were looking at the women currently involved in the Royal Cup. "Rumiko Gaidoku. Strange, according to her profile, she was born on Earth, but three years after Second Impact, her family had scraped together enough to relocate to Zi. She's from Japan, just like you, but hasn't been back there ever since her third birthday and an attempt on her mother's life by some common crooks. Got into piloting Zoids at age eleven and joined a team three years ago under a special circumstance not all that different from those of your current age; certain people from Earth that are younger than nine or ten demonstrate a unique compatibility with Zoids. The Excalibur Team. She's the only member who pilots a Shadow Fox, one of the rare Zoids still in service. The Excalibur Team is also in Class "A" like we are and heading for the Royal Cup. And, based off of everything else here in her online profile, she's never, ever met your father, Shinji."
Shinji sighs as he feels relief over knowing this. The last thing he needed was for his father to be manipulating some other person into trying to pick a fight with him out of spite or something.
"She's quite a looker, though," Valerie expresses. "You like her, don't you?"
"Huh? That's ridiculous. I only met her, like, two hours ago at a convenience store getting food. Who likes someone they met just once?"
"Oh, so you mean to say that you don't believe in love at first sight?"
"Huh?!"
"Love at first sight's a term used by humans to refer to how they can feel a romantic interest for another person after seeing them for the very first time."
"I… No, not once have I ever felt that way."
"Maybe you haven't met the right person just yet."
"I find it hard to believe that there's anyone out there that's interested in me like that."
"But it can happen, Shinji. There's always someone out there for someone else. There's hardly a soul in existence that doesn't crave for the company of another soul. Or that…uh… Dammit, what was it that Geisha once mentioned? It was about that colored string or thread that ties people together."
"You mean, the Red Thread of Fate?"
"Yeah, that's it."
"Sorry to say, I don't believe in that, either."
"What?!" They hear Geisha gasp, as she and Drake come into the room and see the profile on the computer screen. "How can you not believe in such a concept?! The belief that a love so strong that it can bind people together, even if they're from different places, completely different walks of life, even different time periods, it's just as powerful as the bond between Zoid and pilot."
"It's not easy to believe in love when you come from a family that doesn't even tell you that they care about you. They dote on their son, my cousin…but with me, they… Well, it's one of the reasons why I don't want to go back to Japan or the Earth in general. There's no love for me back there, not even with my parents."
"But," says Drake to him, "you're bound to find love if you look for it. Or just wait for it. People on Earth, what do they have now? Dating profiles? Romance ads in newspapers? Dating apps? Or you're old-fashioned, and you want to be the chaser, looking for someone that actually likes you for you. Who on Zi these days behaves similar to the people on Earth that look for people for something that isn't love? Not many. If they were to, however, we probably wouldn't have the Zoid battles. Actually, most romances usually develop due to the Zoid matches; people tend to find their matches when on opposite sides. Whoa, is that the Gaidoku girl? The one with the Shadow Fox? She's attractive for an Earthborn."
It was another reminder that out of the Clover Team, Shinji was the only one that actually belonged to Earth; Nico, Drake, Geisha and Valerie were all Zoidians. With a sigh, Shinji taps the screen blank and walks away; since he now knew who Rumiko Gaidoku was, there was no need to address this issue further. He just wanted to know who she was, not attempt to initiate something that was not likely to happen. Plus, he didn't see himself as the romantic type for anyone, whether it was here on Zi or back on Earth.
"Love is a battlefield, Shinji!" Valerie yells at him. "Love is also a battlefield! It will find you if you let it!"
Returning to his quarters, Shinji falls onto his bed and shuts his eyes, trying to block out the world around him. Was love in the cards for him while he was on Zi? Did he have a chance at a romantic relationship with someone that actually liked him? After meeting Rumiko, he didn't mind the idea of a future with someone that didn't pursue him for reasons as insignificant as greed or arrogance.
-x-
Despite his obligation to understand who his opponents would be in the Royal Cup, Gendo focused on the Clover Team and their Zoids above all other teams and soloists. But if he didn't keep his mind versed on the other obstacles that were in the way, his actions would be perceived as a sense of favoritism due to his son being on the team.
"…The Eternia Team…Duma Fitzgerald…the Excalibur Team…Alexander Gordon…Asta Hydrias…the Storm-Twist Team…the Clover Team… Each of you are beneath me, especially you, Shinji. I will crush all of you."
-x-
NERV's focus was split between staying up to date with the Angels and wanting to see the Royal Cup on Zi broadcast on Earth for all to witness. Most of the reason was to see how well Shinji and the Clover Team would fare after starting as a newbie group and racking up victories against other Zoid teams to solidify their position in Class "A", with the minor reason being that after learning about Gendo's recent entry into the tournament and wondering how Shinji was going to beat his father when he possessed a Zoid that made his Liger Rogue seem like a kitten.
"…So which team are you betting on, besides the Clover Team?" Misato hears one of the technicians ask someone else as she sat in a bar located in the city that was frequented by NERV during their off hours.
"I got four-hundred yen on the Excalibur Team," a woman tells them.
"Six-hundred-fifty yen on the Storm-Twist Team!"
"Whichever team wins the Royal Cup, I just hope they can beat former Commander Ikari," she hears a man say. "No matter how he says that he wants to be better than others, it just sounds like he has a vendetta against his son for not showing up when he wanted him to pilot the Eva. How many people develop vendettas and choose to act on them because they can't admit that they hate someone?"
Misato sighs as she takes out her smartphone and looks at the Zoid page detailing the Clover Team, looking at Shinji's profile. It felt like as the Royal Cup got closer and closer to its day, the day that the boy would come face-to-face with his father on the battlefield was fast approaching, and she could only imagine how the battle would turn out between father and son. If she were a betting lady, she would've bet sixty-thousand yen on Shinji winning the cup. Winning it…and forcing his father to return to Earth and letting the rest of their family know that he was not coming back after building a better life on Zi.
I hope the Angels stop coming now that Adam and Lilith are gone, she prays.
-x-
Being in Class "A" had its advantages, but Shinji didn't like to do anything that would jeopardize the Clover Team's chances of getting to the Royal Cup, which was now eight days away. So, here he was, in a park in the neighboring city, on a sunny day, just minding his own business as people were going about their own business. In truth, Shinji still had difficulty adjusting to having all this time on his hands and being able to do whatever he chose to because, as a competitor on a Zoid team during a tournament, he was exempt from any educational programs that were active, such as school. And because he wasn't in school when his father sent for him to come to Tokyo-3, the same time when Nico decided to poach him, he didn't have any school to even go to in order to resume his education. Not that he wanted to pick up where he left off if he had to go back to Earth, being the worst-case scenario should the Clover Team lose.
"Aw, crap," he hears a female voice say on the walk path, seeing that it was, to his surprise, Rumiko Gaidoku, dressed in a gray sports bra and short shorts, with blue leggings with a serpent sewn into their outer sides, hands on her knees, covered in sweat on her exposed skin on her head, shoulders and midriff.
Shinji's eyes widened in surprise; he had seen Valerie in her lingerie whenever she was not wearing her outdoor outfit that made her look like she should be in a movie somewhere, but this was a different kind of sight for his perception here. The girl was a year older than him, from a time before Second Impact, free from the twisted reality of those born after were pulled into because of his parents and the people they worked with and for, and despite having seen her once already, this was the first time he had seen…well, this much of her that was…there to see. She had what could be described by the typical teenage boy as a "killer body", muscular, athletic, curvy in everyplace you wanted to touch, including the places where you didn't want to think about touching. For Shinji, it really made him reiterate his thoughts on there being any possibility of romance in his future.
Thunk. His train of thought was broken by the discovery of the girl he had seen twice now sitting beside him on the bench.
"I hope you don't mind my sitting here," she says to him. "I've been running for four hours to burn off some calories."
"Uh…no, I don't mind at all," he responds, looking away from her. "It's a public park. I'm just sitting here watching the world go by."
Rumiko sits back and looks up at the sky, resting her leg muscles.
"Can I ask what brought you here?" She asks Shinji, getting his attention.
"Here as in the park," he states, "or here as in Zi?"
"The park."
"I have nothing much to do until the start of the Royal Cup. I'm just trying to relax."
"You sound like you have no clue how to relax right now."
"Oh, really?"
"What do you see yourself doing if you win?"
"Just trying to build a life here. You?"
"Having never won at all, I'd just want to be able to pay for my parents' medical bills because they got sick four years ago. Beyond that, I don't have any other ambitions based off of winning the Royal Cup. I guess I don't know what else I'd do if I won."
"Your parents are sick?"
"Cancer."
"I'm sorry."
"It's okay. They went through Hell to get my brother and I off Earth after Second Impact. I just want to pay them back for bringing us here where life is better."
"Your intentions are better than my own."
"I know that I said I was hoping to see you again, but I didn't expect to see you again so soon. And how can you be sure that my intentions are better than your own?"
"What you're doing, you're doing for your family's sake. Part of why I'm doing what I'm doing is to keep away from mine. You said you looked at my profile, so you must know why I'm not around those people at all. Why I'm not interested in going back to Japan."
"It's hard not to when you choose to put down as much of your personal information out there to make the whole of Zi understand that when it comes to your family, you're basically an outcast and your parents are not all that different from criminals, wanting to capitalize upon something immensely dangerous…and they're upset with you because you're making your own decisions about how you want to live your life…which isn't really wrong of you if you choose not to want anything to do with their ambitions. You're the reluctant and tragic hero of their twisted story…and they're the heartless villains of your adventurous story that leads to a conclusion yet to be written by you. How many children get to choose between their families and their own morality when faced with something they know could cause harm to others if they did as they were told?"
"I…couldn't say for sure. I just rather avoid my family and try to survive on my own, come what may in the future."
"Yeah."
"And Zi is…well, Zi is beautiful when you look at it. It's…not a bad place to consider relocating to in order to build a new life. It feels like home…even when it isn't."
"Yeah. Zi is home."
-x-
"Somehow, I figured I'd find you two up here," went Drake as he climbs up to the roof of the hangar and spots Valerie and Geisha, sunbathing with a small pool of half-melted ice and water nearby.
"It's hot," Valerie tells him, laying on her front beside a large umbrella on her left, her bra undone. "We're miles away from the nearest indoor pool, and you don't wanna know where I have a sun rash."
Drake just looks down at the two women that currently look like they needed to be at a beach instead of a desert canyon…and then walks over to a cooler and pulls out a canned coffee.
"I'm just going to say this 'cause I don't want to say something else," he lets them hear, popping the can. "We're so close to winning that Royal Cup, I can taste it."
"Oh, really?" Geisha, who was laying on her back, her beachwear consisting of a beige one-piece that had been ripped in half at the waist, questions him. "And what does winning it taste like?"
Chugging down the icy beverage, Drake replies, "Like melted ice cream mixed with a cold beer."
Both women look at him and express, "Sounds about right."
"Hey, have any of you seen Shinji get back from the city?" They each turn to see Nico climbing up to the roof, wearing a pink one-piece and straw hat, sweating.
"No," they all say to her.
"He must still be there. Any chance he encountered that Gaidoku girl again?"
They look at her like something of the sort was rather obvious.
"What?" She questions. "I'm also curious about whether or not Shinji may be interested in some other girl, since his primary concern is knowing if she's someone on his father's payroll."
"She's not on his father's payroll," Valerie tells her. "She's on the Excalibur Team."
"Ai wa senjō (Love is a battlefield)," Geisha utters.
"Huh?" Nico reacts. "Am I meant to understand any of that right now, Geisha?"
"I'm a romantic when it comes to relationship developments. And Shinji is… Well, everyone needs love in their lives at some point."
"That may be true, but I wouldn't expect Shinji to…rush into it. I mean… The Excalibur Team? Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no."
"What?" Valerie questions.
"The leader of that team booked a match against our team tomorrow."
Cough! Drake nearly chokes on his beverage and looks at Nico.
"But we're already guaranteed our right to compete in the Royal Cup!" He says, feeling like they were being cheated.
"We're in. The match they requested will be a virtual expo to heighten the anticipation."
"Virtual Zoid matches?" Valerie utters as she sits up and redoes her bra. "I've never been one to shy away from a challenge, but aren't the point of virtual matches being to test one's ability to operate other Zoids in virtual settings? Shinji's among the eight percent of individuals currently unable to operate Zoids outside the one they are most compatible with using."
This, of course, meant that Shinji, even in a virtual reality competition, would be easy to track due to the fact that the only Zoid he could operate was Liger Rogue, as he had tried to find compatibility with other Zoids before officially joining the Clover Team, and Nico knew he was a special case. But she was fine with that drawback; there were many Zoid pilots that were only compatible with one type of Zoid, one particular Zoid, and it was often always due to age, familiarity or just because of limited options at the time. Even she was among the few that demonstrated compatibility with limited Zoid options, the primary being her Gustav. Most great legends revolved around the usage of one type of Zoid as years passed, and among those legends was this one man that operated a liger-type all his life, and this made Nico suspect that it was why liger-type Zoids were among the limited Zoids still in production.
-x-
"…So, you won your Shadow Fox at an expo after several Zoid teams were scouting for new recruits?" Shinji asks Rumiko.
"Not something I'm proud of, but yes," she answers him as they were sitting in a Ferris wheel that was over one-hundred meters in height. "The previous owner didn't want to sell it when he wanted to see who could prove to be deserving of it. I practically fought against thirty other people to deserve it, and every single one of them was older than I am and had more experience with Zoids. Most claimed my victories were a fluke, but the previous owner didn't see my wins as a fluke, that I had shown more gusto than most were willing or able to show. It also turned out that the Shadow Fox found people that actually wanted to prove their worthiness as being superior than those that think that they are superior."
"Zoids pick their pilots."
"Exactly."
The view of the city from up high was both scary and mesmerizing. It allowed the two teens to look down from an unspecified height and see the people scurrying around like ants…and feel on top of the world.
"Can I ask you a personal question, Shinji?" Rumiko asks him.
"Sure," he replies.
"We both want to win the Royal Cup, and we both serve our respective teams…and we don't want to see someone like your father win at all," she states. "What do you suppose would be the best strategy to use against someone with a Death Stinger?"
"Me? I would say that a combination of strength in numbers and hit-and-run tactics, but I've never fought anyone with a Death Stinger before. It was among the Zoids blacklisted, and he picked it for the power it provides. I don't really know how to face a Zoid like that until after I come face-to-face with it."
"Nobody has ever had to contend with a Death Stinger until now. Most of the people on Zoid teams are pretty scared of facing it."
"I don't blame them for being scared. My father right now is pretty scary…but he's a soloist, so he lacks one important aspect of any team."
"Which is?"
"Trusting your team to have your back on the battlefield."
"True. Soloists make for easy targets because they operate on their own."
The Ferris wheel began moving again and they were slowly being let down.
"What's the first thing you'd do if you won the Royal Cup, Shinji?" Rumiko asks.
"The first thing? Find an apartment," he says. "What would you do if you won? After, of course, you took care of your parents' medical bills?"
"I'd do the same as you, finding an apartment. What's the second thing?"
"Get on with my life knowing that I'll never go back to Japan. You?"
"My mother says to find a rich boyfriend, but I'm not interested in rich boyfriends. I'd just want someone that…gets me as I am."
"That gets you as you are? Care to elaborate?"
"Someone that can tolerate my presence and know that I can handle my problems until I ask for help when they become difficult to deal with on my own. And…not be like they have to be the hero and treat me like a damsel in distress."
"You look like you can handle yourself very well."
"Tell that to my father. He still looks at me like I'm seven. It barely occurs to him that I'm not the little girl he watched beat a grown man at poker."
Shinji went wide-eyed at this revelation.
Rumiko looks at him and explains, "My mother was his stand-in before she got sick first. I stepped up to help him seven times. I have an unreadable face when I play poker."
"That's amazing," he says.
"Not really. Poker is the same as with Zoid battles. It's all a matter of the fortunes of fate. It was once said that fortune is like a woman, being that she favors the bold."
"And what would a woman say of a young man that simply wants to obtain a happy life far from the aches and pains of his past that felt like it was going nowhere?"
"She'll know when he obtains that which he longs to have on his own terms."
"Eh-heh-heh. Well…then it's a race to the finish when the Royal Cup starts."
It felt strange, these two talking together in a Ferris wheel. They were from rival teams striving to get into Class "S", and yet…they were just talking about what they'd do if they won. One wanting to ease the burdens of her family…and the other wanting to take control of his life by escaping from his family. One would think that these two have nothing in common, yet these two seemed to have much in common in their own ways. They had hopes and fears that were understandable and had people standing in their way in one way or another, one of whom was simply a man with a vendetta.
"Do your best to win, Shinji Ikari," Rumiko tells him. "Only one can win the Royal Cup…and it shouldn't be your father."
"Same to you, Rumiko," Shinji responds. "Do your best to win the Royal Cup. There can be only one winner, and it can't be someone with a vendetta and no proper ambitions."
When the Ferris wheel brought their car down to be vacated, the two teens stepped off and Rumiko looks to Shinji.
"See you on the battlefield," she tells him.
"Likewise," Shinji says to her, and she runs off. Wow.
-x-
The setting sun had lowered the temperature by a substantial degree, but it was still more than seventy degrees out, and it was taking all of Valerie's effort to refrain from walking around the hangar in nothing.
"Seriously, as much as I would probably like to see that," Drake had told her earlier, "please leave the things us men like to keep in the imagination for a while longer."
Nico and Geisha were, surprisingly, grateful for Drake saying that to Valerie; despite being women themselves, they didn't need to have that happening any time soon.
Bang! The fan above Nico's head blew out in her room.
"Aaaurgh!" She groans.
"Good news and bad news, Nico," she hears Drake say over the intercom. "The bad news is that the AC is down until I get it running again."
"And what's the good news?" She asks him as she gets up and grabs a cup of water, only to pour it over her head and back.
"Shinji just got back," he answers her.
"It's about time he got back. Where was he for so long?"
She gets up and vacates her quarters and sees Shinji in the hallway, an unusually positive expression on his face.
"Huh?!" She reacts; he looks as though he was left alone in a very happy place. "Shinji…you look like someone left you alone in a very happy place."
"Oh, really?" He responds.
"You saw the Gaidoku girl again, didn't you?"
"Now, what makes you say that?"
"Sounds like the Red Thread of Fate is true."
"I met Rumiko in the park and all we did was talk."
"What?!" They hear Geisha yell from up the hallway, and she comes out of a room, her yukata undone and exposing her undergarments. "All you did was talk with her?!"
Shinji looks away and covers his eyes.
"Must it matter what I do with my personal time?" He asks as Geisha closes her yukata.
"As we're nearing the Royal Cup, everything any of us does is something to hear gossip about."
"Well, all we did was go on a Ferris wheel."
"Oh! Oh! Oh! Spectacular!"
Shinji was starting to suspect that Geisha was overthinking what he did today into what he didn't do at all. Besides, all he did was talk with Rumiko. It wasn't even close to what…might be considered a date or something similar.
"Don't mind Geisha right now," Nico says to Shinji. "It was too hot out today and heatstroke affects us all differently."
"Heatstroke? Right. Nobody likes heatstroke."
"But just to keep you informed, we have been challenged to a virtual Zoid match tomorrow. We're up against the Excalibur Team. It doesn't affect our entry into the Royal Cup, but it's an exposition to heighten the anticipation everyone is expected to have when it starts."
This, of course, makes Shinji realize that Nico had said "Excalibur Team", meaning that they were going up against the same team that Rumiko was affiliated with. In addition to this, he also knew that he would stand out in a virtual match due to his Zoid pilot data only having Liger Rogue as the Zoid he worked best with because it was the only Zoid he was able to operate without difficulty so far; he had tried to operate other Zoids in simulations, but was met with the same issues he had before he started piloting Liger Rogue.
"What is to be expected in this virtual rumble?" He asks Nico.
"Just keeping the spectators excited," she answers him. "Though, I'm pretty sure both teams will be in for a thrill I can't really comprehend."
"Why?"
A second later, the AC came back on and the hallways felt the chilly breeze they all needed.
"Ah, yeah," went Geisha, pulling open the left side of her yukata at her chest, "all I need now is an iced tea."
"Virtual matches and their preset designs for matchups are still decided by way of the coin toss," Nico explains, "and I'm not good with tossing coins to get the best result."
Drake returns to the hallway, his right arm mildly singed near his elbow.
"Minor electrical burn," he informs them, "and Nico has lost a total of forty-two coin tosses since I met her…with only seventeen coin tosses ending in her favor out of fifty-nine tosses."
"So, Nico's had more losses than wins. A coin toss is just a game of chance, just like spinning a bottle or catching a bouquet of flowers." Shinji states, but then sees Drake's burn looking like it was starting to blister. "Whoa, Drake."
Drake looks down at his burn and groans.
"Aurgh!" He goes as he walks away to the bathroom.
-x-
Regardless of human innovation, current holographic technology was still, in the words of Zoidians that were alive since the turn of the previous century, more than two-hundred-seventy-four years behind the holographic technology employed on Zi, which people on Earth could only get a taste of through visual headsets instead of just watching holographic matches on tablets or big screens. This, in turn, also meant that when it came to watching virtual matches, they were limited to being in on the action.
As Misato places on a VR headset she had to buy just to watch a virtual Zoids match, she found herself sitting in a floating sphere out in a virtual desert among dozens of other people.
"Whoa," she utters as she sees two groups of four virtual Zoids on opposite sides of the terrain. "What the…"
The Zoids, unfortunately, were not much to look at. Because it was a virtual setting, the Zoids in question were devoid of any features beside their basic endoskeletal structure that resembled a mammalian organism's skeletal structure, possibly to prevent identities from being revealed until the battle begins.
Shine! A bright glow appeared in between the two groups and assumed the form of a Judge, albeit one that appeared more humanoid than robotic, resembling a gynoid.
"The virtual expo match between the Clover Team and Excalibur Team shall commence upon the victim of the coin toss roulette," the Judge announces in a female voice.
Misato then sees a holographic little girl appear before the Judge on the right and an adult woman appear on the left. She recognized the little girl as the one that recruited Shinji to join the Clover Team, but she didn't know who the woman was, other than being the head of the Excalibur Team.
"Call your choice," the Judge informs them.
"Heads," the woman, sporting long, zebra-striped hair and silver eyes, says.
"Tails," the girl, Nico, utters, and the Judge summons a virtual roulette.
"Spin," she tells them, and they both step on a blue spot in front of their feet, causing the roulette wheel to spin. "Release."
They stepped back and the roulette began to slow down. It was then replaced by a large coin that fell to one side, revealing its result. A long, reptilian tail coiled up was shown.
"Winner: Nico," the Judge reveals. "Begin your customization."
"Clover Team VR Configuration Code: Full House," Nico utters, and the four Zoids behind her change into the four Zoids that made up her current team.
"Begin your customization," the Judge tells the woman.
"Excalibur Team VR Configuration Code: Mirror Force," the woman utters, and the Zoids behind her change to a Zoid that looked like some sort of canine with a type of Gatling cannon on its back.
"Wow," went Nico, "all of them are Shadow Foxes."
"One of your fighters made quite an impression on one of mine," the woman utters with a devious smile. "Quite the conundrum, young people's emotions are."
"This feels like a waste of time," Misato hears the voice of Gendo, which made her realize that he was also present among those here to watch the expo.
In front of her was a small heads-up keyboard, which explained why her headset came with interactive gloves. She raised her hands up and typed in Gendo's name, and upon pressing the "enter" key, she was in front of the father of the pilot of Liger Rogue, who seemed disgusted with being here in a virtual setting.
"What brings you here?" She asks him.
"Learning about the enemy," he answers, but it was the way he said it that made Misato worry that he was going to cross the line later.
"Some people just want to watch a match that is a taste of what's to come," she tells him.
"There won't be much to see when it starts," he replies.
"Virtual Battle Mode: Zero-Nine-Eight-Two," the Judge declares, raising her arms up. "Begin!"
Everyone watches as the Zoids all scatter around the virtual landscape, but one of the Shadow Foxes goes after Liger Rogue.
"What do you hope to learn from this?" Misato asks Gendo.
"How to defeat him," he states cryptically, although she knows that he means Shinji.
"Do you hate him that much because he rejected you?"
"He had only one thing to do, and some little girl enables him to run away from his responsibilities. All he was expected to do was pilot the Eva, nothing more, nothing less."
"Except he had no training, sir, which means that any chance he stood against the Third Angel at that time was less than manageable. And honestly, look at how far he's gotten since he left the Earth. He's become skilled at piloting his Zoid because he's had time to get used to it. To expect him to pilot an Eva against an Angel, knowing virtually nothing about why he was called to Tokyo-3 to begin with, that wasn't only foolish of you to do, it was reckless for NERV and dangerous for Shinji. And we're past the point of being able to make him do anything now that he's matured enough to make his own decisions about what he wants…and part of what he wants…is to never have to come back to Earth if he wins. But even if you prevent him from winning the Royal Cup, it won't do you any good to force him to go back. There's nothing here for him to come back to."
"I don't expect him to return to Earth, willingly or unwillingly."
"And what do you mean by that?"
"Just that. I don't expect him to return to Earth, willingly or unwillingly."
But Misato didn't like the way Gendo stated his response on what Shinji would do if he lost the Royal Cup. If anything, she feared that Gendo, despite his being lightyears away from Earth on the other side of the Milky Way, had designs that were still negative for Shinji. But because he didn't say exactly what he aimed to do in the end, Misato had to suspect that he would go to extremes out of spite towards his own son.
"I will be rooting for your son to win," she lets him know where she stands over this.
"It won't make any difference in the end," he tells her, and then disappears.
This could get ugly when the Royal Cup starts, she suspects, just as the Clover Team's Storm Sworder swoops down and cleaves the left back leg off one Shadow Fox. Damn! Who's that girl that pilots the Storm Sworder? Geisha? She's got nerves of steel to be doing dives like that!
-x-
With one Shadow Fox defeated, the Clover Team was down one adversary and just needed to defeat the remaining three. The one in front of Shinji started releasing holographic smoke from its body.
"A little smoke never hurt anyone," he says, but then notices that the smokescreen was getting bigger than he had expected, covering most of their battleground. "This is not a little smoke."
"Can you find me, Liger Rogue?" He hears the voice of Rumiko on his intercom. "In case you don't know, Shadow Foxes are stealthy and almost invisible to all types of sensors."
"Sneaky like a fox. I'm guessing someone from the Clover Team impressed your team?"
"What can I say? You're quite the spirited fighter when you have something you want and do your best to obtain it."
"Simple is better than wanting the finer things in life, as simple is basic. What do you seek above all? What is your desire?"
"Right now, my desire is to see which of us comes out on top. Come and get me."
Shinji smiles and charges his Zoid into the smokescreen; he may have been unable to see where Rumiko's Zoid was hiding or moving in the smoke, but he aimed to find her any way he could, even in a virtual battlefield.
To be continued…
A/N: This was overdue, but I surprise myself sometimes by using previous original characters with new twists and turns to their backgrounds. I couldn't have Shinji not experience some sense of romance in his life on Zi, and it was asked before if the women on the Clover Team would try to put the moves on him, which wasn't going to happen. And to be honest, whenever I think of that song, I think of Meg Griffin from Family Guy singing it in Russian as she's dancing. Who doesn't think of that?