Neon Senshi Evangelion

Sixteen

Ryouji Kaji nodded to Gendo's secretary, the attractive young woman smiling just a bit coolly at him. 'Wonder if she's talked to Misato?' he wondered at her expression. Still he mustered his most charming smile as he said, "Hi there, I'm..."

"You're Ryouji Kagi, agent of the UN," the attractive woman cut him off. The brown haired woman continued, "Satsuki Ooi, and I'm married."

'Oooh, deffinately has talked to Misato,' Kaji thought as he hid a wince. Aloud he said, "Is Director Ikari in?"

"He and Chief Ikari, yes," Satsuki noted, "you can go right in."

"Thank you," Kaji nodded and headed inside.

"Have a nice day," she added impishly, then Satsuki went back to work.

The office was open and bright, though that was a deceptive feeling. He knew that with the right lighting it could be turned into a dark, ominious chamber very easily. Gendo sat at his desk, fingers steepled in front of him, while Yui sat in a couch pushed up against one wall of the office.

"Agent Ryouji," Yui said rather flatly.

'Yup, still carrying a grudge over how I treated Misato,' he thought with a sigh. "Chief, Director, it's good to see you," Kaji lied politely.

"Welcome back," Gendo said a bit more warmly.

"Thanks," Kaji smiled, glad he had a sort of ally there.

"How did things go?" Yui asked as she got up and walked over to him and the desk.

"The trip to the labs was a bust, I'm sorry to say," Kaji admitted as he put his briefcase on the desk and popped it open. Within was a shrunken, barely alive piece of organic material in a modified containment device.

"That's..." Gendo trailed off.

"The piece of supposedly unidentified alien matter the German labs had," Koji confirmed, "I checked, it matches samples you already have."

Yui scowled as she muttered, "Damn it, I was hoping they actually had a piece of the original life form."

Gendo shrugged slightly, "The explosion was so powerful it annihilated anything at ground zero. We're lucky we found anything."

"Anyway, I paid off a employee to get a sample out. They are also, apparently, trying to culture the life form," Kaji noted. "Is that safe?"

Yui made a face, "Probably not, but they're a private lab affiliated with the UN. It's not like we can stop them."

"Well, we could drop a Evangelion on them," Kaji quipped.

"Don't joke," Gendo shook his head as he continued seriously, "that IS our final option if this gets completely out of hand."

"It's potentially that bad?" Kaji looked startled.

"If it gets out of control enough, it can infect and change other organic matter. Like people," Yui said tiredly. "YES it can be that bad."

Kaji nodded seriously. "Can I get that in writing?" he asked. When Yui looked at him curiously he continued, "I can at least pass a warning up the chain of command at the UN. May not do any good, but it might help."

Gendo and Yui exchanged a look. "Okay," Yui agreed, "but I'm not passing anything classified on to them."

"Understood," Kaji agreed. Thay had already seen what the lab could do on it's own, no need to give them more data.

Moving on Gendo asked, "I wanted to get your impressions of Asuka, as you travelled with her quite a bit."

"Intense, focused, driven," Kaji rattled off promptly. "She's polite, pretty much, but she has no time for fools or people she considers fools."

"I was quite impressed by her piloting skills," Yui noted, "and almost as soon as she arrived she was asking Misato about booking simulator time."

"As I said, intense and driven," Kaji sighed. "From what I saw she doesn't really interact with people. With a few exceptions, anyway."

No one brought up Asuka's mother. They were all well aware of her issues, so there wasn't much point in rehashing it.

"At least she gets along with Misato," Gendo sighed. He smiled slightly, "And Rei says she likes her, too."

Yuiu looked at Kaji curiously, "We're thinking of putting Asuka in with the other students. Do you think that's a good idea?"

Kaji raised his eyebrows. "Put a college level student in a class with lots of students below her grade level, where she will be bored out of her mind." He paused, "I can't IMAGINE how that could possibly go wrong."

Yui smirked. "Well, you don't have to be sarcastic," she laughed. "Bad idea?"

"I don't think she'd actually be disruptive," Kaji admitted, "but no, not a good idea. A bored Asuka is trouble waiting to happen."

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"Come on, it'll be fun," Misato noted as she casually dragged Asuka down the busy street to the local arcade.

"I can't believe a grown woman goes to the arcades," Asuka shook her head.

"There is nothing wrong with hitting an arcade," Misato insisted.

"Video games," Asuka sniffed.

"Or interactive training devices surrounded by distractions simulating real combat conditions," Misato said smugly.

"Did you just make playing video games training?" Asuka gave her a look.

"Gee, I think I just did," Misato winked.

Asuka growled something unflattering in German, which Misato cheerfully ignored.

"Besides, this'll give you a chance to socialize a bit," Misato added as they went inside.

"You didn't," Asuka started then saw Shinji and Rei inside, "you did."

Misato ignored yet another muttered curse in German as she waved. "Hey Rei, Shinji," she smiled then asked, "how was school?"

"Endless purgatory," Rei deadpanned.

"It wasn't THAT bad, Miss 'I work a book ahead because I am THAT much of a overachiever,' " Shinji sighed.

"I get bored easily," Rei shrugged.

Asuka had to fight back a smile. "So this overgrown child dragged you two out here too?" she asked, gesturing to Misato.

"I object to be called a 'overgrown child,' thank you," Misato said dryly.

"But she has no objections to dragging us out," Shinji added wryly.

"Nope," Misato agreed.

Rei laughed then asked, "What's the plan?"

"Well, I thought you and Asuka could go toe to toe on the mech simulator, or trade off with Shinji," Misato said, buying tokens at the booth in front.

"And what will YOU be doing?" Asuka asked taking a few tokens.

Misato pointed to several booths off to one side, "Car racing!"

"I shoulda known," Shinji laughed.

"Am I missing a joke?" Asuka had to ask.

"She's a decent driver in real life, but in games? Crashes all the time," Rei explained.

"I'm not THAT bad," Misato pouted and stalked off.

Asuka smiled as she followed the others over to the mech game. Despite her misgivings, this was actually going pretty well. And really... what could go wrong?

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"HYAAAA!" Asuka yelled as she punched one punk in the face, sending him reeling backwards, bleeding from the nose. She used the opening to step in close to another guy crowding in, slamming her elbow into his chest and knocking him back.

"Watch yourself," Rei warned as she delivered precise rabbit punches to another punk. She also had a hell of a kick, which she demonstrated by kicking a fellow in the face.

Shinji was NOT a trained fighter, but had gamely picked up a folding chair and was wailing away at anyone who got near. He had a certain bezerk fighting style that was oddly effective, interestingly enough. Though unlike the two girls he was CLEARLY not having a good time.

Meanwhile, their supposed adult chaparone and guardian was having a great time.

Misato mostly fought defensvely, a cheery smile n her face as she blocked punches. But when she spotted a opening a fist would shoot out, hammering a opponent away. She seemed to hit a lot harder than you would expect, but it was possible she just worked out.

"This is TOTALLY your fault!" Asuka growled at Misato as she kneed a guy in the balls.

"Oooh," Shinji visibly winced in sympathy.

"How is this my fault?" Misato demanded, "You started it!"

"He flipped my skirt," Asuka shot back.

Then, they finally heard the wail of police sirens off in the distance, growing louder. The punks looked at each other, swiftly decided that it was better to take off and did so, grabbing their fallen comrades as they did. The women were too tired to chase them, and instead assessed their wounds and the damage to the arcade.

"Mom is gonna kill us," Shinji noted, looking around at the wrecked tables and spilled vcrap. At least none of the video games appeared damaged.

"Yui can pay it off out of NERV's budget," Misato waved that off. "Everyone okay?"

"Bruises," Rei said, and Asuka nodded agreement.

"I could use some clean pants..." Shinji sighed bitterly.

To be continued...

Notes: Next chapter will be a BIG tonal shift as I'm gonna tackle some Sailor Moon related stuff.