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- earth
You just made my day. Thank you shade!
Ignis Aurum Probat [Neon Genesis Evangelion]
- Thread starter shadenight123
- Start date
Chapter Seven: "Absit Invidia"
- Location
- https://discord.gg/z9tBvbh
Chapter Seven: "Absit Invidia"
The Angel's humanoid frame and monstrous built was nothing compared to the speed and grace with which it moved. The alien did not seem to care about the concrete below its feet, or the buildings around it. Large, cross-shaped pylons of energy exploded around Shinji's form even as he moved, a timer having appeared on the upper right corner.
"Detached from their power cord, Evangelions can last a variable amount of time, ranging from three to five minutes depending on how much stress is put on the Eva."
Shinji ground his teeth. He wanted to ask 'why', but he couldn't, not when he was trying his hardest not to scream due to the heat that was turning his skin red with welts.
"To answer your unspoken question, the Entry Plug's connection to the Evangelion's core and thus nervous system requires energy, without it, no signals can pass," Doctor Ritsuko spoke through the microphone, only for a short snort to echo near her.
"Use the buildings to hide from the Angel," Rei said. "Stop running and start thinking."
It was easy for her to say, she wasn't the one being boiled alive by a pylon of energy that seemed to know where he was, as blasts of energy ripped apart the buildings of the simulation, creating large holes on the crumbling walls with molten rock around the edges.
Loud roaring explosions echoed from the Angel's wrists as spears of light left its wrists, before the alien pushed its feet on the ground, cracking it as the creature jumped high in the air, landing with both hands right in front of Shinji's face -in the simulation- and slamming them both down together with a burning white energy surrounding its fingers.
The screen flickered to black, a 'Terminated' appearing in front of Shinji's eyes.
The LCL cooled down, and the Simulation Entry Plug stopped shaking back and forth. Shinji caught his breath as the LCL was drained and replaced with clean one, the simulation restarting once more.
"Never stop moving, but try not to let the Angel reach the Eva's power cord. Unless you plan on finishing the fight in three minutes," Rei's voice came through hard, a tiny amount of smugness seeping through.
Shinji swallowed his nervousness, narrowed his eyes, and clenched the handles. Now he knew what to expect, so it wouldn't be that bad, would it?
When the simulation restarted, the Angel was already midway through with its charge towards him, and he yelped as he jumped back, only to have the Angel grab the power cord and pull, pulling the Eva along until the safety pins disconnected, sending him to crash on the ground.
"When the Angel attacked, I sortied alone," Rei said. "All other means to stop it failed. The AT-Field stopped practically everything but N2 firepower, and that simply winded it rather than stop him. In the end," Rei's voice wavered briefly, "had he come alone, I suppose the damage could have been contained."
Shinji ground his teeth. "But he didn't," Rei continued. "This isn't the complete simulation-only a part of the Angel's tactics. The complete simulation..."
"Perhaps another time," Doctor Ritsuko said.
"Why not now? Maybe this will scare him away," Rei answered primly.
"What could be worse than this?" Shinji asked, both of the simulated Evangelion's arms having crossed in front of its face to protect from a kick coming from the Angel itself. "This thing-it's like fighting a force of nature or something." He groaned in a show of effort as he pushed the Angel away from him while standing up at the same time.
Rather than run away, he pushed on by getting closer to the Angel, the Evangelion's fist coming down on its strange plague-doctor mask. A second fist soon followed the first, and as the Evangelion screamed, Shinji pushed the button to open the shoulder pylon, grabbing the progressive knife and slamming it down on the Angel's core, even as the creature tried to stop his thrust.
The Evangelion overpowered the Angel as Shinji screamed, before slamming the knife home and taking a small breath of satisfaction. "This-This didn't...It's done."
"Good," Rei said, "Now we can proceed with the simulation of what really happened."
As the video screen refreshed, Shinji watched.
He watched, and then his mouth hung open, as he looked at the Angel stand amidst the screaming, swarming, yelling masses of ants that weren't ants, but people. The Angel opened its arms, and pillars of light shaped like crosses blasted at those beneath it, as if they were meaningless insects unworthy of living.
Charred remains were a mercy for the survivors, for many disappeared, leaving only blotches on walls or pavements, and sometimes not even that. The ground quaked, rippling apart as blasts from the Angel's wrists tore apart the buildings, shattering all forms of cover, uncaring of those that disappeared.
Those that weren't vaporized and ended up too close to the creature outright melted into puddles of blood, and if Shinji hadn't already been without breakfast in his stomach, he would have lost it once more.
This was not a beast moving on instinct. This was a cold, ruthless and calculating force that wanted the most damage possible on its enemies, and just as it stopped its slaughter, it turned its beak with glowing eyes towards Shinji.
And Shinji, somehow, knew fear.
The Angel of before had been ruthless, yes, but there had been no emotion in its movements. It had walked around, limped even, and attacked with the coldness of a machine, but without the thrumming life of a living being.
This one was different. He'd have to praise whoever created the simulation, for in that moment, Shinji forgot he wasn't actually in danger.
He really just wanted to run away from that thing. He really wanted nothing more than to take the first plane back to Europe and leave this up to Rei and his father and everyone else that wasn't him.
But he had nowhere to run, had he? His father would hold his career over his head until he did this, so-so there was nowhere to run. He could stand up and fight, or curl on himself and die.
He had no intention of dying.
He hadn't gone through enough therapy sessions to just regress back to being the wailing angsty teenager who wondered why his father didn't love him.
And this was a simulation. If he grew scared of this, when it came to the next, actual Angel...what would he do?
"I won't run away," Shinji whispered. "I won't run away." He narrowed his eyes. "I won't run away!" he snarled. There was no 'Must', but only 'Will not'. It was his choice to stand his ground, not his father's pressure.
He was the one who made the choice to stay, because he would not run away.
Charging ahead, he screamed as the Angel waited for his arrival, before using its left arm to deflect the incoming blow and then slam the right hand right against the Evangelion's core, igniting the hand that blasted the Evangelion's chest right off, thus 'terminating' both the Evangelion and the Entry Plug.
"We thought them mere beasts," Doctor Ritsuko whispered. "But we were wrong."
Shinji coughed out the LCL from his lungs as he stood on his knees outside the Simulation Entry Plug. His arms were shaking and his vision was blurry. He took deep lungful of air, even as they tasted of blood and smelled thickly of iron to his tongue and nostrils.
"Still feeling up to it?" a female voice asked a few steps away from him. Rei's voice, so close up, had lost a bit of the metallic edge that the audio feed gave her, but while the sound of it was familiar, it was as he lifted his gaze and focused that all forms of breath left his lungs.
"What are you looking at?" Rei said with a snort. "When you're done staring at my plugsuit-" Shinji's cheeks blushed fiercely as he averted his gaze. Rei's hair was short, and light blue. She had pale white skin and red eyes, coupled with a white plugsuit and a pair of quite round attributes that made him-no, no, he was not staring at those.
The sense of familiarity did not leave him, but he couldn't put his finger on it.
"Now go up to the control room," Rei said next. "I'll show you how it's done," she added.
Shinji nodded awkwardly, stumbling on his next few steps before finally reaching for the control room after a few more minutes of hasty jogging through a couple of stairways and corridors.
Doctor Ritsuko, in person, looked every bit the professional woman he had expected her to be. This didn't change the fact that she had her hands in her lab coat's pockets, and with a cigarette in her mouth, she was doing her best impression of being unimpressed.
"Doctor," Shinji said, trying to sound cheerful and amiable. He had probably failed somewhere along the lines, because the woman simply gave him a curt nod, pulled the cigarette out of her lips and exhaled.
"Professor," she acknowledged. "I'm not going to say something as crude and humorless as 'call me mother'."
"Thank you," Shinji said, quite awkwardly.
"I should mention you have a half sister," Doctor Ritsuko said. "Her name is Naoko, she's twelve, and the last time she saw her father in the flesh was six months ago."
Shinji blinked. "Uhm...I...What."
Doctor Ritsuko shrugged lightly. "Synchronization is a tricky affair that involves factors that are both physical and psychological. I would rather all things that might lower your synchronization score to be revealed now, rather than later," she took another puff from her cigarette.
"Ah, so-why? Is it because stress and anxiety release specific chemical agents that somehow-"
Doctor Ritsuko smiled softly, and turned off the cigarette. It was true that she had not liked the idea of having Yui's son around, both for personal, and practical, reasons. Still, it was nice having the chance to actually answer questions and have a pilot that didn't want to break her neck due to some perceived slight on her part.
Well, no, not really 'perceived'.
She had married Gendo.
What surprised her the most however was that the man had accepted her terms of a marriage and a child, in exchange for her continued assistance.
He hadn't showed up even at the moment of Naoko's birth, but she hadn't cared by then. Time had soothed and calmed her 'infatuation', but she had at least earned something from it, something far from small.
Taking Yui's place by Gendo's side.
If not in his heart, at the very least on paper.
The Angel's humanoid frame and monstrous built was nothing compared to the speed and grace with which it moved. The alien did not seem to care about the concrete below its feet, or the buildings around it. Large, cross-shaped pylons of energy exploded around Shinji's form even as he moved, a timer having appeared on the upper right corner.
"Detached from their power cord, Evangelions can last a variable amount of time, ranging from three to five minutes depending on how much stress is put on the Eva."
Shinji ground his teeth. He wanted to ask 'why', but he couldn't, not when he was trying his hardest not to scream due to the heat that was turning his skin red with welts.
"To answer your unspoken question, the Entry Plug's connection to the Evangelion's core and thus nervous system requires energy, without it, no signals can pass," Doctor Ritsuko spoke through the microphone, only for a short snort to echo near her.
"Use the buildings to hide from the Angel," Rei said. "Stop running and start thinking."
It was easy for her to say, she wasn't the one being boiled alive by a pylon of energy that seemed to know where he was, as blasts of energy ripped apart the buildings of the simulation, creating large holes on the crumbling walls with molten rock around the edges.
Loud roaring explosions echoed from the Angel's wrists as spears of light left its wrists, before the alien pushed its feet on the ground, cracking it as the creature jumped high in the air, landing with both hands right in front of Shinji's face -in the simulation- and slamming them both down together with a burning white energy surrounding its fingers.
The screen flickered to black, a 'Terminated' appearing in front of Shinji's eyes.
The LCL cooled down, and the Simulation Entry Plug stopped shaking back and forth. Shinji caught his breath as the LCL was drained and replaced with clean one, the simulation restarting once more.
"Never stop moving, but try not to let the Angel reach the Eva's power cord. Unless you plan on finishing the fight in three minutes," Rei's voice came through hard, a tiny amount of smugness seeping through.
Shinji swallowed his nervousness, narrowed his eyes, and clenched the handles. Now he knew what to expect, so it wouldn't be that bad, would it?
When the simulation restarted, the Angel was already midway through with its charge towards him, and he yelped as he jumped back, only to have the Angel grab the power cord and pull, pulling the Eva along until the safety pins disconnected, sending him to crash on the ground.
"When the Angel attacked, I sortied alone," Rei said. "All other means to stop it failed. The AT-Field stopped practically everything but N2 firepower, and that simply winded it rather than stop him. In the end," Rei's voice wavered briefly, "had he come alone, I suppose the damage could have been contained."
Shinji ground his teeth. "But he didn't," Rei continued. "This isn't the complete simulation-only a part of the Angel's tactics. The complete simulation..."
"Perhaps another time," Doctor Ritsuko said.
"Why not now? Maybe this will scare him away," Rei answered primly.
"What could be worse than this?" Shinji asked, both of the simulated Evangelion's arms having crossed in front of its face to protect from a kick coming from the Angel itself. "This thing-it's like fighting a force of nature or something." He groaned in a show of effort as he pushed the Angel away from him while standing up at the same time.
Rather than run away, he pushed on by getting closer to the Angel, the Evangelion's fist coming down on its strange plague-doctor mask. A second fist soon followed the first, and as the Evangelion screamed, Shinji pushed the button to open the shoulder pylon, grabbing the progressive knife and slamming it down on the Angel's core, even as the creature tried to stop his thrust.
The Evangelion overpowered the Angel as Shinji screamed, before slamming the knife home and taking a small breath of satisfaction. "This-This didn't...It's done."
"Good," Rei said, "Now we can proceed with the simulation of what really happened."
As the video screen refreshed, Shinji watched.
He watched, and then his mouth hung open, as he looked at the Angel stand amidst the screaming, swarming, yelling masses of ants that weren't ants, but people. The Angel opened its arms, and pillars of light shaped like crosses blasted at those beneath it, as if they were meaningless insects unworthy of living.
Charred remains were a mercy for the survivors, for many disappeared, leaving only blotches on walls or pavements, and sometimes not even that. The ground quaked, rippling apart as blasts from the Angel's wrists tore apart the buildings, shattering all forms of cover, uncaring of those that disappeared.
Those that weren't vaporized and ended up too close to the creature outright melted into puddles of blood, and if Shinji hadn't already been without breakfast in his stomach, he would have lost it once more.
This was not a beast moving on instinct. This was a cold, ruthless and calculating force that wanted the most damage possible on its enemies, and just as it stopped its slaughter, it turned its beak with glowing eyes towards Shinji.
And Shinji, somehow, knew fear.
The Angel of before had been ruthless, yes, but there had been no emotion in its movements. It had walked around, limped even, and attacked with the coldness of a machine, but without the thrumming life of a living being.
This one was different. He'd have to praise whoever created the simulation, for in that moment, Shinji forgot he wasn't actually in danger.
He really just wanted to run away from that thing. He really wanted nothing more than to take the first plane back to Europe and leave this up to Rei and his father and everyone else that wasn't him.
But he had nowhere to run, had he? His father would hold his career over his head until he did this, so-so there was nowhere to run. He could stand up and fight, or curl on himself and die.
He had no intention of dying.
He hadn't gone through enough therapy sessions to just regress back to being the wailing angsty teenager who wondered why his father didn't love him.
And this was a simulation. If he grew scared of this, when it came to the next, actual Angel...what would he do?
"I won't run away," Shinji whispered. "I won't run away." He narrowed his eyes. "I won't run away!" he snarled. There was no 'Must', but only 'Will not'. It was his choice to stand his ground, not his father's pressure.
He was the one who made the choice to stay, because he would not run away.
Charging ahead, he screamed as the Angel waited for his arrival, before using its left arm to deflect the incoming blow and then slam the right hand right against the Evangelion's core, igniting the hand that blasted the Evangelion's chest right off, thus 'terminating' both the Evangelion and the Entry Plug.
"We thought them mere beasts," Doctor Ritsuko whispered. "But we were wrong."
Shinji coughed out the LCL from his lungs as he stood on his knees outside the Simulation Entry Plug. His arms were shaking and his vision was blurry. He took deep lungful of air, even as they tasted of blood and smelled thickly of iron to his tongue and nostrils.
"Still feeling up to it?" a female voice asked a few steps away from him. Rei's voice, so close up, had lost a bit of the metallic edge that the audio feed gave her, but while the sound of it was familiar, it was as he lifted his gaze and focused that all forms of breath left his lungs.
"What are you looking at?" Rei said with a snort. "When you're done staring at my plugsuit-" Shinji's cheeks blushed fiercely as he averted his gaze. Rei's hair was short, and light blue. She had pale white skin and red eyes, coupled with a white plugsuit and a pair of quite round attributes that made him-no, no, he was not staring at those.
The sense of familiarity did not leave him, but he couldn't put his finger on it.
"Now go up to the control room," Rei said next. "I'll show you how it's done," she added.
Shinji nodded awkwardly, stumbling on his next few steps before finally reaching for the control room after a few more minutes of hasty jogging through a couple of stairways and corridors.
Doctor Ritsuko, in person, looked every bit the professional woman he had expected her to be. This didn't change the fact that she had her hands in her lab coat's pockets, and with a cigarette in her mouth, she was doing her best impression of being unimpressed.
"Doctor," Shinji said, trying to sound cheerful and amiable. He had probably failed somewhere along the lines, because the woman simply gave him a curt nod, pulled the cigarette out of her lips and exhaled.
"Professor," she acknowledged. "I'm not going to say something as crude and humorless as 'call me mother'."
"Thank you," Shinji said, quite awkwardly.
"I should mention you have a half sister," Doctor Ritsuko said. "Her name is Naoko, she's twelve, and the last time she saw her father in the flesh was six months ago."
Shinji blinked. "Uhm...I...What."
Doctor Ritsuko shrugged lightly. "Synchronization is a tricky affair that involves factors that are both physical and psychological. I would rather all things that might lower your synchronization score to be revealed now, rather than later," she took another puff from her cigarette.
"Ah, so-why? Is it because stress and anxiety release specific chemical agents that somehow-"
Doctor Ritsuko smiled softly, and turned off the cigarette. It was true that she had not liked the idea of having Yui's son around, both for personal, and practical, reasons. Still, it was nice having the chance to actually answer questions and have a pilot that didn't want to break her neck due to some perceived slight on her part.
Well, no, not really 'perceived'.
She had married Gendo.
What surprised her the most however was that the man had accepted her terms of a marriage and a child, in exchange for her continued assistance.
He hadn't showed up even at the moment of Naoko's birth, but she hadn't cared by then. Time had soothed and calmed her 'infatuation', but she had at least earned something from it, something far from small.
Taking Yui's place by Gendo's side.
If not in his heart, at the very least on paper.
Last edited:
Mizu
Software Developer
- Location
- Victoria, Australia
was drained and replaced with a clean version, the
I'm not sure that works, but 'clean one' just doesn't flow well to me.
So. Each chapter introduces more changes to canon, it seems - I quite like Adult!Shinji, truth be told.
Mechasaurian
Big Bossu
- Location
- Lost among fields of history
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Last edited:
Mizu
Software Developer
- Location
- Victoria, Australia
Shade updates fast, yep. He once achieved multiple 3k updates in a day. Possibly more.
...This gains a little extra meta hilarity if you've watched the commentary for Martian Successor Nadeisco...
That Shade is a mad man! A Mad Ma~n!!!
Check out his FF.net profile and see look at the dates for some of his early stories.
Chapter Eight: "Animum debes mutare, non caelum."
- Location
- https://discord.gg/z9tBvbh
Chapter Eight: "Animum debes mutare, non caelum."
The simulation, viewed from outside, was like watching an action movie. An action movie that somehow involved a very gory, very messy death for the Angel in question as Rei piloted with daunting grace through the blasts.
"Before you ask," Ritsuko said, "The simulation is run by the Magi system, and the algorithm dealing with it renders purely casual the path of attacks. There is no fixed 'safe path' across the attacks. Rei is simply calculating where the hit will land based on the position of the enemy Angel's wrists." She did not smile. "She does have years of experience on her back."
"Why was I even called here?" Shinji asked, after the Angel's whole body was flung backwards by a thundering kick. "I don't understand this. You already have her, why do you need me? As a spare?"
"To be blunt, professor," Doctor Ritsuko said, "Yes. We will no longer underestimate the Angels' threat. It might happen that in a fight, Rei will be wounded and a second Angel might come up shortly after. There is no way of knowing if the next Angel will be stronger, or weaker, or what form it will possess. We simply know that it will come. We simply know that it will aim at the Geofront, and along the way it will destroy as much as possible in the most ruthless way possible." The Doctor then took a deep lungful of her cigarette, letting it nearly burn at her fingers. "Rei, the fight is over."
On the screen, Rei's Evangelion was slamming the Angel's head on the concrete floor -the severed Angel head, the cracked core a little distance away.
"What did that man mean with my mother not being completely dead?" Shinji asked in a soft whisper.
"I wonder," Ritsuko replied. "I'm not supposed to tell you. I'm sure he has a little scenario in his head on when he'll reveal it. Perhaps he might never say it," she sighed, grinding the tip of the cigarette butt on the nearby ashtray. "A lot of things only appear dead, either as a defensive mechanism against predators, or to stave off winter. Sometimes we think that people haven't really died, but linger on in our memories," here Ritsuko snorted, "Which I hope is not the case. So many people are dead that I wish would not haunt me, but sometimes you just can't escape ghosts," she chuckled, as if some sort of bitter inside joke had just been made.
Rei had meanwhile been ejected from the simulation Entry Plug, and with a prideful smirk on her face began to walk her way out of the room with the plugs and probably towards the control tower of the simulation program itself.
"I didn't think he could be this sentimental," Shinji answered in turn. "Especially after remarrying." Somehow, he couldn't put the bitterness out of his voice.
"Each year, like clockwork, he stands in front of the tomb of your mother," Ritsuko remarked. "That's the one thing of his character that is easy to read."
"I'm sorry," Shinji said, sheepishly scratching the back of his head and looking sideways.
Ritsuko looked at the man with a puzzled expression, "Why are you apologizing? It's not your fault."
"Actually, I was going to make a salt joke to lighten the atmosphere," Shinji replied, "But then I thought 'Na'."
Ritsuko stared briefly caught off-guard by the sudden joke, a single lock of her otherwise pristine hair ending out of place. Luckily, she had finished her cigarette or it would have fallen on the ground.
She began to laugh at the stupid, silly joke a moment later.
"Professor, that was a low blow," Doctor Ritsuko said once she managed to regain control of herself.
When Rei entered the room, she displayed a proud expression on her face. "Pilot Ikari," her smile was smug, "That is what you must do. You won't achieve it by the time of the next Angel attack, but if you follow my example, maybe you won't die."
Shinji furrowed his brows. "Next Angel attack?"
"Next week," Rei answered calmly, as if it was obvious and someone had already told him. "You were not yet informed? The Major should have mentioned it-" she didn't. Perhaps she would have wanted to, but she didn't.
Shinji looked at the simulation, and at the recordings of just how much his piloting had 'sucked', and then back at the Simulation Entry Plug. "Can I go back in there?" he asked.
"After lunch," Doctor Ritsuko spoke agreeably. "Rei will show you where the cafeteria is."
She grabbed a few stacks of printed papers and made her way out, her shoes clicking on the floor as the sound died out a little bit at the time, until only silence remained in the room between Shinji and Rei.
Rei had a furrowed and pensive gaze, and then turned around. "Follow me," and with those words, the two were off.
Only, they were not headed to the cafeteria. Rei took a detour that ended with both of them in front of a vending machine, where she inserted a card to grab one of those cheap instant-made noodles served with hot water, which came out after a few minutes piping hot and with steam emerging from the top of it.
"This...doesn't look like the cafeteria."
"Unless you possess a fetishittyc streak," Rei replied curtly, "I would suggest you keep your sarcasm to yourself," she added, her voice monotone. "Order something, or starve. Unless the Major actually remembered to give you your card?"
Shinji nervously laughed, bowing a bit in thanks. "She didn't," he said as he grabbed something similar to the woman's choice. "What else did she forget to tell me?"
"I don't know," Rei answered. "What authorization have you been granted?" She took the disposable chopsticks and began to take a few bites of the soggy noodles. They were perhaps so packed with salts and preservatives that years down the road, they would still be perfectly fit for consumption. Perhaps the mummies of the future would be the people who ate nothing but this sort of food.
"I don't know," Shinji replied, taking a bite of the -extremely- salty thing. "It's not like I even knew I'd end up piloting. I didn't ask for this, but if my choice is between starving an university's worth of students and professors or sacrificing a bit of my pride, then I'll choose the latter."
"It's more than your pride that you're going to risk," Rei answered. "It's your life. You are not disposable. No human being is."
"Oh," Shinji mumbled. "I see-I must be a source of worry for you, right?" he smiled, "You are one kind woman, Miss Ayanami, but I'm used to taking care of myself. Like my psych-ahem, a friend of mine used to say, 'You cannot change the sky, so change your disposition instead'. We are the ones who must change in order to face the world, not change the world in order for it to accept us."
Rei looked honestly flustered, and grew quiet for a whole minute. "That's obvious," Rei said in the end, neutrally picking at her noodles. "But you're misunderstanding, professor." Her gaze cooled considerably in a short amount of time. "I'm not worrying about your life on the battlefield. I'm not that selfless of a person." She shook her pale blue-haired head. "If the choice is between saving you or killing an Angel, I will always choose the latter option."
"I understand," Shinji said. "I-Well, it's going to be horrible when that happens, but...but if everything that I was told is true, if humanity is at risk of extinction, and if what I saw in the simulation is even a bit true -all those deaths, all that pain- then I'll do my best. Since I'm one of the few that can pilot the Evangelion, I'm not going to run away from my duty."
Rei said nothing, and Shinji grew quiet, if for a brief minute. "There is one thing though," Shinji said. "You spoke briefly of a 'Dummy Plug' system. Considering the words 'Entry Plug', and how you claimed they could be a better substitute than me...is there a sort of auto-pilot thing, a Dummy System, so to say, of the Evangelion?"
Rei nodded. "Yes," she said. "It is capable of synchronizing with the Evangelion Units, and is simply a 'trick' to convince the Evangelion that there is a living pilot inside of them. Unfortunately, it works by imbuing the thought patterns of the pilot into...well, I never bothered with the nerd-stuff." Rei shrugged. "But it would take more than a week to create a 'Dummy System' for you, and even then, it would never 'learn' from the battles. The Commander wasn't wrong in denying my suggestions. He just did not explain why. I...I was tired and nervous when I argued with him," she looked anxious, if only in the way she thinned her lips and pressed them together for a short instant. "The Commander's orders are always in the best interest of mankind."
She tried a faint smile, "He has the weight of the world on his shoulders, that's why he appears distant, but I'm sure he deeply cares about the people he loves, even if he can't-"
Rei dropped the vegetable noodles into the trash can a second later, and punched the side of the wall with her right fist, and then her left, until her knuckles bruised and some bits of skin flaked away.
Biting her lips to the point of drawing blood, Rei took a deep breath much to the startled expression of Shinji.
"Forgive me," she said with a monotone voice. "I forgot I had an urgent appointment."
She walked away there and then, as if the devil was hot on her tail, and she had seen hell in front of her.
To Shinji's eyes, she looked...afraid. As if something extremely unpleasant had happened.
Yet, he couldn't understand the mystery that was Rei Ayanami. Her voice, also, near the end had changed to a softer, warmer and...nostalgic tone.
...
He walked back into the simulation control room, and after sitting down in front of one of the many terminals, he began to type away trying to find anything useful about the 'Angel' of thirteen years before.
The keyboard began to type out his queries even before his fingers were put to it, the Magi System easily recognizing what was sought and why, and granting access since it was not something classified to anyone working at Nerv.
The video showed a very young Rei, clearly a teenager, leaving Nerv aboard her Evangelion Unit. She looked determined, if slightly afraid. The plugsuits had apparently remained obscenely spandex-like since their inception, but what attracted Shinji's attention the most was the Angel. The real Angel, the one that was truly fought, and how he did indeed squash ruthlessly like ants all around them.
Then he brought a hand to his mouth and pulled closer to him the bin, for he had his lunch to dispose of.
It wasn't the Angel's brutality that haunted Shinji as he played his cello later in the night, with Penpen sleeping soundly nearby.
It was the sound of Rei's screams as she fought, bled, and burned against the Angel she had faced alone.
The simulation, viewed from outside, was like watching an action movie. An action movie that somehow involved a very gory, very messy death for the Angel in question as Rei piloted with daunting grace through the blasts.
"Before you ask," Ritsuko said, "The simulation is run by the Magi system, and the algorithm dealing with it renders purely casual the path of attacks. There is no fixed 'safe path' across the attacks. Rei is simply calculating where the hit will land based on the position of the enemy Angel's wrists." She did not smile. "She does have years of experience on her back."
"Why was I even called here?" Shinji asked, after the Angel's whole body was flung backwards by a thundering kick. "I don't understand this. You already have her, why do you need me? As a spare?"
"To be blunt, professor," Doctor Ritsuko said, "Yes. We will no longer underestimate the Angels' threat. It might happen that in a fight, Rei will be wounded and a second Angel might come up shortly after. There is no way of knowing if the next Angel will be stronger, or weaker, or what form it will possess. We simply know that it will come. We simply know that it will aim at the Geofront, and along the way it will destroy as much as possible in the most ruthless way possible." The Doctor then took a deep lungful of her cigarette, letting it nearly burn at her fingers. "Rei, the fight is over."
On the screen, Rei's Evangelion was slamming the Angel's head on the concrete floor -the severed Angel head, the cracked core a little distance away.
"What did that man mean with my mother not being completely dead?" Shinji asked in a soft whisper.
"I wonder," Ritsuko replied. "I'm not supposed to tell you. I'm sure he has a little scenario in his head on when he'll reveal it. Perhaps he might never say it," she sighed, grinding the tip of the cigarette butt on the nearby ashtray. "A lot of things only appear dead, either as a defensive mechanism against predators, or to stave off winter. Sometimes we think that people haven't really died, but linger on in our memories," here Ritsuko snorted, "Which I hope is not the case. So many people are dead that I wish would not haunt me, but sometimes you just can't escape ghosts," she chuckled, as if some sort of bitter inside joke had just been made.
Rei had meanwhile been ejected from the simulation Entry Plug, and with a prideful smirk on her face began to walk her way out of the room with the plugs and probably towards the control tower of the simulation program itself.
"I didn't think he could be this sentimental," Shinji answered in turn. "Especially after remarrying." Somehow, he couldn't put the bitterness out of his voice.
"Each year, like clockwork, he stands in front of the tomb of your mother," Ritsuko remarked. "That's the one thing of his character that is easy to read."
"I'm sorry," Shinji said, sheepishly scratching the back of his head and looking sideways.
Ritsuko looked at the man with a puzzled expression, "Why are you apologizing? It's not your fault."
"Actually, I was going to make a salt joke to lighten the atmosphere," Shinji replied, "But then I thought 'Na'."
Ritsuko stared briefly caught off-guard by the sudden joke, a single lock of her otherwise pristine hair ending out of place. Luckily, she had finished her cigarette or it would have fallen on the ground.
She began to laugh at the stupid, silly joke a moment later.
"Professor, that was a low blow," Doctor Ritsuko said once she managed to regain control of herself.
When Rei entered the room, she displayed a proud expression on her face. "Pilot Ikari," her smile was smug, "That is what you must do. You won't achieve it by the time of the next Angel attack, but if you follow my example, maybe you won't die."
Shinji furrowed his brows. "Next Angel attack?"
"Next week," Rei answered calmly, as if it was obvious and someone had already told him. "You were not yet informed? The Major should have mentioned it-" she didn't. Perhaps she would have wanted to, but she didn't.
Shinji looked at the simulation, and at the recordings of just how much his piloting had 'sucked', and then back at the Simulation Entry Plug. "Can I go back in there?" he asked.
"After lunch," Doctor Ritsuko spoke agreeably. "Rei will show you where the cafeteria is."
She grabbed a few stacks of printed papers and made her way out, her shoes clicking on the floor as the sound died out a little bit at the time, until only silence remained in the room between Shinji and Rei.
Rei had a furrowed and pensive gaze, and then turned around. "Follow me," and with those words, the two were off.
Only, they were not headed to the cafeteria. Rei took a detour that ended with both of them in front of a vending machine, where she inserted a card to grab one of those cheap instant-made noodles served with hot water, which came out after a few minutes piping hot and with steam emerging from the top of it.
"This...doesn't look like the cafeteria."
"Unless you possess a fetishittyc streak," Rei replied curtly, "I would suggest you keep your sarcasm to yourself," she added, her voice monotone. "Order something, or starve. Unless the Major actually remembered to give you your card?"
Shinji nervously laughed, bowing a bit in thanks. "She didn't," he said as he grabbed something similar to the woman's choice. "What else did she forget to tell me?"
"I don't know," Rei answered. "What authorization have you been granted?" She took the disposable chopsticks and began to take a few bites of the soggy noodles. They were perhaps so packed with salts and preservatives that years down the road, they would still be perfectly fit for consumption. Perhaps the mummies of the future would be the people who ate nothing but this sort of food.
"I don't know," Shinji replied, taking a bite of the -extremely- salty thing. "It's not like I even knew I'd end up piloting. I didn't ask for this, but if my choice is between starving an university's worth of students and professors or sacrificing a bit of my pride, then I'll choose the latter."
"It's more than your pride that you're going to risk," Rei answered. "It's your life. You are not disposable. No human being is."
"Oh," Shinji mumbled. "I see-I must be a source of worry for you, right?" he smiled, "You are one kind woman, Miss Ayanami, but I'm used to taking care of myself. Like my psych-ahem, a friend of mine used to say, 'You cannot change the sky, so change your disposition instead'. We are the ones who must change in order to face the world, not change the world in order for it to accept us."
Rei looked honestly flustered, and grew quiet for a whole minute. "That's obvious," Rei said in the end, neutrally picking at her noodles. "But you're misunderstanding, professor." Her gaze cooled considerably in a short amount of time. "I'm not worrying about your life on the battlefield. I'm not that selfless of a person." She shook her pale blue-haired head. "If the choice is between saving you or killing an Angel, I will always choose the latter option."
"I understand," Shinji said. "I-Well, it's going to be horrible when that happens, but...but if everything that I was told is true, if humanity is at risk of extinction, and if what I saw in the simulation is even a bit true -all those deaths, all that pain- then I'll do my best. Since I'm one of the few that can pilot the Evangelion, I'm not going to run away from my duty."
Rei said nothing, and Shinji grew quiet, if for a brief minute. "There is one thing though," Shinji said. "You spoke briefly of a 'Dummy Plug' system. Considering the words 'Entry Plug', and how you claimed they could be a better substitute than me...is there a sort of auto-pilot thing, a Dummy System, so to say, of the Evangelion?"
Rei nodded. "Yes," she said. "It is capable of synchronizing with the Evangelion Units, and is simply a 'trick' to convince the Evangelion that there is a living pilot inside of them. Unfortunately, it works by imbuing the thought patterns of the pilot into...well, I never bothered with the nerd-stuff." Rei shrugged. "But it would take more than a week to create a 'Dummy System' for you, and even then, it would never 'learn' from the battles. The Commander wasn't wrong in denying my suggestions. He just did not explain why. I...I was tired and nervous when I argued with him," she looked anxious, if only in the way she thinned her lips and pressed them together for a short instant. "The Commander's orders are always in the best interest of mankind."
She tried a faint smile, "He has the weight of the world on his shoulders, that's why he appears distant, but I'm sure he deeply cares about the people he loves, even if he can't-"
Rei dropped the vegetable noodles into the trash can a second later, and punched the side of the wall with her right fist, and then her left, until her knuckles bruised and some bits of skin flaked away.
Biting her lips to the point of drawing blood, Rei took a deep breath much to the startled expression of Shinji.
"Forgive me," she said with a monotone voice. "I forgot I had an urgent appointment."
She walked away there and then, as if the devil was hot on her tail, and she had seen hell in front of her.
To Shinji's eyes, she looked...afraid. As if something extremely unpleasant had happened.
Yet, he couldn't understand the mystery that was Rei Ayanami. Her voice, also, near the end had changed to a softer, warmer and...nostalgic tone.
...
He walked back into the simulation control room, and after sitting down in front of one of the many terminals, he began to type away trying to find anything useful about the 'Angel' of thirteen years before.
The keyboard began to type out his queries even before his fingers were put to it, the Magi System easily recognizing what was sought and why, and granting access since it was not something classified to anyone working at Nerv.
The video showed a very young Rei, clearly a teenager, leaving Nerv aboard her Evangelion Unit. She looked determined, if slightly afraid. The plugsuits had apparently remained obscenely spandex-like since their inception, but what attracted Shinji's attention the most was the Angel. The real Angel, the one that was truly fought, and how he did indeed squash ruthlessly like ants all around them.
Then he brought a hand to his mouth and pulled closer to him the bin, for he had his lunch to dispose of.
It wasn't the Angel's brutality that haunted Shinji as he played his cello later in the night, with Penpen sleeping soundly nearby.
It was the sound of Rei's screams as she fought, bled, and burned against the Angel she had faced alone.
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Chapter Nine: "Sed ipse spiritus postulat pro nobis, gemitibus inenarrabilibus."
- Location
- https://discord.gg/z9tBvbh
Chapter Nine: "Sed ipse spiritus postulat pro nobis, gemitibus inenarrabilibus."
Shinji Ikari understood that, trained soldier or not, everyone felt the nervousness stir in the air. He could hear the husband and wife duo of the floor below yell at one another near-constantly towards the last day of 'peace', but they had the decency to do it outside of their children's earshot, but not of his since he was one floor up.
On the positive side of things, he had managed to acquire a razor and shave off his stubble, leaving behind nothing but the 'smooth' skin of a twenty-six years old professor, who somehow managed to rake in more hours of sleep than what he had ever achieved in tenure. This...this still didn't change the fact that the clock was ticking down, and unless the Angel suddenly made a no-show, and his father arrived to clap in front of him with a 'You've been pranked!' banner hanging behind him, he would need to pilot the Evangelion.
He knew Rei would face the brunt of it, and if she wasn't able to defeat the Angel, then he truly had no chances. All that he could do was pilot, and hope for a lucky hit, or to at least be helpful.
He was in his plugsuit, settled within the LCL of his Entry Plug, within minutes of the alarm blaring about a Pattern Blue having been detected.
"Stay behind me, like in the simulation," Rei said curtly, her Evangelion holding on to one of the 'Pallet Rifles' that were, in theory, capable of harming the AT-Fields of the Angels and diminish their strength. They hadn't a captive Angel to test them on, so they were doing both prototyping and actual battling for mankind's survival.
Around the two Eva, both with their power cords firmly attached to their backs, rifles in their arms and wary crimson eyes looking back and forth, silence reigned. The city had begun evacuation since the morning, and was now largely empty.
"The Angel is heading straight for you two! He's-" the buildings were there one second, and the next they had been cut into ribbons. Ribbons of pure white sliced and diced across concrete, steel, and the very clouds above their heads as everything they met was cut, torn apart and reduced into neatly arranged fragments of dust.
Motes of dust remained of what had once been a ten story tall building. Motes of dust, and a strange hunched-back creature with a skeletal rib-cage protruding from its chest, the ribs themselves deformed and twisted, but protecting its core.
The Angel's head was a crown of pulsing dark crimson veins, as it seemed to wear a robe made of its own tattered flesh, stitches of light shining across it. It eyed them hungrily with a large, spherical eye of crimson hatred, but amidst the motes of dust, the whips of light sliced forth.
Rei deftly dodged to the side, "Protect the power cord!" she yelled as she used one hand to hold the cable behind her, and the other to open fire on the Angel, the bullets impacting the AT-Field and generating the famous orange octagons.
Shinji clutched the handles as he tried the same, but a simulation in a safe harbor and reality were two different things. He moved to the side, holding the cable but leaving his back exposed temporarily for the whip to snake around him and then crush at his Eva's midriff, making him scream from the sudden tightening sensation around his own stomach.
He could feel the pain of the Evangelion reverberate across his body.
He did not like it.
He also did not keep it a secret, since he began to scream the moment he felt the whip around his midriff heat up like a burning sun, the AT-Field of his Eva the only thing that kept him whole.
"Hold on," Rei said, emptying the entire cartridge on the Angel, who didn't move but kept pressuring Shinji's Evangelion until the AT-Field's indicator began to flicker.
"Synchronization rating is falling-Shinji! I know it hurts, but if you let go, you'll be cut in half!" Major Katsuragi had an easy time saying that, since she wasn't the one inside the Evangelion being crushed to death by a single whip of light!
"I know!" the Major exclaimed. Had he said that aloud? He probably had.
"Arrgh! Get it off me!" Shinji yelled, dropping the Pallet Rifle as he began to squeeze the handles tightly, trying to think hard about freeing his arms from the deadly grip, even as the burning pain around him did not seem to cease.
The Angel's second whip stopped trying to skewer Rei, and instead swung itself forward and against Shinji's Evangelion.
Rei did nothing to stop the attack, which beheaded neatly the Eva-Zero-One, spraying a shower of crimson blood as the garbled screaming of Shinji died out, the man having fallen unconscious from the sudden feedback of losing one's own head.
Rei's Evangelion moved its AT-Field into direct contact with that of the enemy Angel, impacting, pulverizing and denying the resulting contest of wills. The twin whips snaked around the Evangelion's wrists and began to sizzle, shining with the same light at the center of a dying star. The Angel's lone eye burned with hatred as it lifted Rei's unit, before slamming it back down on the ground, letting his whips pierce through the layers of armor as Rei winced from the pain and the pressure.
Pushing on her back, Rei's Eva planted its feet on the Angel's ribcage, and with an agile motion, sent the Angel to fly backwards. Still, the creature did not release the grip, and instead ignited the tentacles, neatly severing the Evangelion's hands and making Rei scream from the pain.
The Angel then stood up, its ribcage slowly but surely regenerating, and began to float forward once more, twisting its whips into deadly grinders of light. With a scream of her own, the hands of her Eva regenerated abruptly amidst showers of blood, which fell copiously from the large robot's frame.
Throwing her rifle at the Angel, she rushed right behind it as the weapon was minced into tiny bits, but her fists and Progressive Knife were not. One hand ripped off a rib, and then punctured the head of the Angel itself, before the Eva's Zero-Zero left arm was neatly severed at the shoulder, soon followed by the whips stabbing through the Evangelion's chest and starting to wriggle around, as if searching for something to destroy -like a heart to smash, or a core to crack.
"Eject," Gendo ordered, "Pilot Ayanami, eject immediately-"
"The commands are not responding," Rei said amidst pained gasps. "I believe-"
With a bellowing roar, a pair of large, white fangs dug into the Angel's crown of flesh, ripping it apart as the alien quivered and shrieked in pain, Eva Zero-One having apparently regenerated its head in a fit of fury, blood drenching the Evangelion's corpse as its fists landed both through the ribcage with startling brutality, before ripping out the core from within the Angel's chest and using it to beat to a pulp the lone eye of the creature.
At least, until the core cracked and exploded in a shower of light and blood, turning most of the city block they had fought in into a sort of pool of blood. The wet dream of all vampires, perhaps, but definitely not Rei's, since in that moment, her eyes were wide and fixed on the Evangelion Zero One and its berserk status.
The crimson eyes stared at her, stared straight at her, deeply into her soul that was hers and not hers, at her body, that belonged to her and yet not to her, and they judged her.
They judged her and she felt the judgement and she despised the judgement of someone that was a part of her and yet was not.
The lights turned off, Shinji's Eva fell down on its knees, the power cord having been cut perhaps in the midst of the battle, and the Berserk status having taken away what little reserves it might have held on to.
There was nothing left.
Yet, the Angel had been defeated.
This...This was a victory, was it not?
Shinji Ikari understood that, trained soldier or not, everyone felt the nervousness stir in the air. He could hear the husband and wife duo of the floor below yell at one another near-constantly towards the last day of 'peace', but they had the decency to do it outside of their children's earshot, but not of his since he was one floor up.
On the positive side of things, he had managed to acquire a razor and shave off his stubble, leaving behind nothing but the 'smooth' skin of a twenty-six years old professor, who somehow managed to rake in more hours of sleep than what he had ever achieved in tenure. This...this still didn't change the fact that the clock was ticking down, and unless the Angel suddenly made a no-show, and his father arrived to clap in front of him with a 'You've been pranked!' banner hanging behind him, he would need to pilot the Evangelion.
He knew Rei would face the brunt of it, and if she wasn't able to defeat the Angel, then he truly had no chances. All that he could do was pilot, and hope for a lucky hit, or to at least be helpful.
He was in his plugsuit, settled within the LCL of his Entry Plug, within minutes of the alarm blaring about a Pattern Blue having been detected.
"Stay behind me, like in the simulation," Rei said curtly, her Evangelion holding on to one of the 'Pallet Rifles' that were, in theory, capable of harming the AT-Fields of the Angels and diminish their strength. They hadn't a captive Angel to test them on, so they were doing both prototyping and actual battling for mankind's survival.
Around the two Eva, both with their power cords firmly attached to their backs, rifles in their arms and wary crimson eyes looking back and forth, silence reigned. The city had begun evacuation since the morning, and was now largely empty.
"The Angel is heading straight for you two! He's-" the buildings were there one second, and the next they had been cut into ribbons. Ribbons of pure white sliced and diced across concrete, steel, and the very clouds above their heads as everything they met was cut, torn apart and reduced into neatly arranged fragments of dust.
Motes of dust remained of what had once been a ten story tall building. Motes of dust, and a strange hunched-back creature with a skeletal rib-cage protruding from its chest, the ribs themselves deformed and twisted, but protecting its core.
The Angel's head was a crown of pulsing dark crimson veins, as it seemed to wear a robe made of its own tattered flesh, stitches of light shining across it. It eyed them hungrily with a large, spherical eye of crimson hatred, but amidst the motes of dust, the whips of light sliced forth.
Rei deftly dodged to the side, "Protect the power cord!" she yelled as she used one hand to hold the cable behind her, and the other to open fire on the Angel, the bullets impacting the AT-Field and generating the famous orange octagons.
Shinji clutched the handles as he tried the same, but a simulation in a safe harbor and reality were two different things. He moved to the side, holding the cable but leaving his back exposed temporarily for the whip to snake around him and then crush at his Eva's midriff, making him scream from the sudden tightening sensation around his own stomach.
He could feel the pain of the Evangelion reverberate across his body.
He did not like it.
He also did not keep it a secret, since he began to scream the moment he felt the whip around his midriff heat up like a burning sun, the AT-Field of his Eva the only thing that kept him whole.
"Hold on," Rei said, emptying the entire cartridge on the Angel, who didn't move but kept pressuring Shinji's Evangelion until the AT-Field's indicator began to flicker.
"Synchronization rating is falling-Shinji! I know it hurts, but if you let go, you'll be cut in half!" Major Katsuragi had an easy time saying that, since she wasn't the one inside the Evangelion being crushed to death by a single whip of light!
"I know!" the Major exclaimed. Had he said that aloud? He probably had.
"Arrgh! Get it off me!" Shinji yelled, dropping the Pallet Rifle as he began to squeeze the handles tightly, trying to think hard about freeing his arms from the deadly grip, even as the burning pain around him did not seem to cease.
The Angel's second whip stopped trying to skewer Rei, and instead swung itself forward and against Shinji's Evangelion.
Rei did nothing to stop the attack, which beheaded neatly the Eva-Zero-One, spraying a shower of crimson blood as the garbled screaming of Shinji died out, the man having fallen unconscious from the sudden feedback of losing one's own head.
Rei's Evangelion moved its AT-Field into direct contact with that of the enemy Angel, impacting, pulverizing and denying the resulting contest of wills. The twin whips snaked around the Evangelion's wrists and began to sizzle, shining with the same light at the center of a dying star. The Angel's lone eye burned with hatred as it lifted Rei's unit, before slamming it back down on the ground, letting his whips pierce through the layers of armor as Rei winced from the pain and the pressure.
Pushing on her back, Rei's Eva planted its feet on the Angel's ribcage, and with an agile motion, sent the Angel to fly backwards. Still, the creature did not release the grip, and instead ignited the tentacles, neatly severing the Evangelion's hands and making Rei scream from the pain.
The Angel then stood up, its ribcage slowly but surely regenerating, and began to float forward once more, twisting its whips into deadly grinders of light. With a scream of her own, the hands of her Eva regenerated abruptly amidst showers of blood, which fell copiously from the large robot's frame.
Throwing her rifle at the Angel, she rushed right behind it as the weapon was minced into tiny bits, but her fists and Progressive Knife were not. One hand ripped off a rib, and then punctured the head of the Angel itself, before the Eva's Zero-Zero left arm was neatly severed at the shoulder, soon followed by the whips stabbing through the Evangelion's chest and starting to wriggle around, as if searching for something to destroy -like a heart to smash, or a core to crack.
"Eject," Gendo ordered, "Pilot Ayanami, eject immediately-"
"The commands are not responding," Rei said amidst pained gasps. "I believe-"
With a bellowing roar, a pair of large, white fangs dug into the Angel's crown of flesh, ripping it apart as the alien quivered and shrieked in pain, Eva Zero-One having apparently regenerated its head in a fit of fury, blood drenching the Evangelion's corpse as its fists landed both through the ribcage with startling brutality, before ripping out the core from within the Angel's chest and using it to beat to a pulp the lone eye of the creature.
At least, until the core cracked and exploded in a shower of light and blood, turning most of the city block they had fought in into a sort of pool of blood. The wet dream of all vampires, perhaps, but definitely not Rei's, since in that moment, her eyes were wide and fixed on the Evangelion Zero One and its berserk status.
The crimson eyes stared at her, stared straight at her, deeply into her soul that was hers and not hers, at her body, that belonged to her and yet not to her, and they judged her.
They judged her and she felt the judgement and she despised the judgement of someone that was a part of her and yet was not.
The lights turned off, Shinji's Eva fell down on its knees, the power cord having been cut perhaps in the midst of the battle, and the Berserk status having taken away what little reserves it might have held on to.
There was nothing left.
Yet, the Angel had been defeated.
This...This was a victory, was it not?
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Dragonskyt
Ashen one, hearest thou my voice, still?
- Location
- Kiln of the First Flame
Don't worry Shinji, you'll get your S2 Engine meal soon enough!
Mizu
Software Developer
- Location
- Victoria, Australia
Fetishitty? I'm not sure.
Woo, two updates at once. Admittedly, the fights seem more gory than in canon, as I don't think decapitation and limb regen were something the EVA could do.
Iuvenal
Desperanda tibi salua concordia socru
- Location
- Terrace IV
In NGE, Unit 01 regenerated appendages in multiple fights, always when going berserk. The fight against Zeruel is the instance that stands out the most. The MPEs also demonstrated this capability, even though they were under the control of dummy plugs.
Chapter Ten: "Palmam qui meruit ferat."
- Location
- https://discord.gg/z9tBvbh
Chapter Ten: "Palmam qui meruit ferat."
When Shinji opened his eyes, he was inside a pristine white room with an equally pearl-colored ceiling, a few neon lights shining brightly overhead. The room was large, but mostly empty. It looked and felt like a hospital room, but someone had apparently emptied it of everything except for the essentials. There wasn't even a clock, and nobody had bothered bringing his cellphone to his side during his sleep.
A whip of light coming like a flash, how ironic that his mind suddenly remembered it. He half-choked at the memory, at the feeling of having his head severed and of the blood pumping out of his neck.
No, he hadn't fallen asleep.
He had been beheaded.
And then he had gotten better.
"It makes sense from a biological point of view," Shinji mumbled. "Like starfishes, although they possess a humanoid body it does not mean their brain must be in their head location. Unless the core is damaged, every other limb shouldn't hold a particular importance...and the head is most definitely a limb," he awkwardly looked around once more. He was talking to himself.
"Great," he grumbled. Holding on to the IV-Drip by his arm, he stood awkwardly up from the hospital bed and began to look around for his clothes. He was feeling sort of breezy, but somehow he had expected it.
The door slid open with a soft hiss, and just outside two guards holding actual and honest-to-god assault rifles looked at him from the sides. They weren't pointing them at him, of course, but had them simply slung around their necks and held near their chests.
"I woke up," Shinji said as if that explained everything.
A few minutes later and a doctor gave him the clear bill of health, handed him back his personal effects and then he was out and about the streets of Tokyo-Three with a very non-suspicious person following him just a few steps behind.
He didn't understand why he needed a bodyguard of all things. Who'd ever want to target him so soon after the Angel's attack, and for what reason? He was one of the pilots that protected the world from Angels, wasn't he? All of this security-was it really needed?
Still, with his pondering he managed to avoid the crowd of people going in the opposite direction. Tokyo-Three was brimming with life now, the evacuation having ended on a positive note with the damage in the process of being repaired already. He could have hailed a cab, but he preferred to walk amidst people. It helped to close the gap, to look at others, see them going about their daily lives. The happy couple that held each other's arms and spoke animatedly, two kids running one after the other, a few businessmen walking with cellphones near their ears, and much more was all laid bare to Shinji's eyes.
This was humanity, and these were the people he had protected.
It made him feel...important.
His cellphone began to buzz, and as he popped it open, he heard a familiar voice, "Excuse me, professor-I'm sorry if I'm being a bother, but-"
"Ah, yes? What is the problem now? Professor Einzberg is being troublesome? I see, I see, now the thesis-look, I'm currently outside right now, can't hear you well," Shinji retorted, finding a quiet spot by the side of the bustling street. "You can't understand why saline solutions are better than distilled water in bacteria cultures? Seriously? Bacterial cells burst in hypo-tonic solutions due to the difference in osmotic pressure between the inside and the outside. Yes, they do need a isotonic solution to keep them from bursting, and it should be tailored to the specific bacteria-seawater bacteria? Well, sterilized seawater-"
Shinji sighed as the stammering student went on a bit. The poor young man -not so younger than him- must have been truly traumatized by professor Einzberg's modus operandi. "Yes, notes are a fundamental part of a thesis research-well, if it were easy, everyone would do it. Since it's not easy, only a few can."
"I'm sorry for bothering you, professor," the student said in the end. "I'll send you something to make up for it. I promise."
"Send me a photo of you graduating with honors then," Shinji answered with a light chuckle. "That's all that I ask."
The conversation ended a scant few seconds later after goodbyes, and with a dreadful sense of longing and nostalgia, Professor Shinji Ikari walked back into the bustling streets, headed for the closest wine shop he could find. He was finishing the wine, and he needed to buy more.
"The Nerv-Card can also be used for purchases outside of the headquarters, right?" Shinji asked the 'non suspicious at all' guard, who nodded. The poor bloke was wearing the most casual of outfits, and if it weren't for the fact that he had greeted Shinji before leaving the hospital, even he wouldn't have guessed he was a bodyguard. "Very well then," Shinji entered, with quite the resolution, the first shop he came across.
When he stepped out, he had a thick carton paper bag with two wine bottles carefully wrapped inside to prevent them from breaking up. If he could get his hands on a piece of fillet, he might have the perfect dinner to celebrate his 'not-death'.
He didn't get his hands on fillet, which was a shame. He did get his hands on some type of fish that required a second trip to the wine shop to get a white wine, and then finally he could head for home with a content whistling to his lips. The moment he opened the door and stepped inside, it was only his natural reaction of tightening the hold over his bags that prevented him from outright throwing the stuff in the air at the sudden noise.
"Congratulations on your victory, Shinji!" Major Katsuragi said cheerfully as she popped one of those carton party-poppers that released strings and colorful glittering pieces of paper -that would be a hassle to clean up later.
"Yeah man! I asked for a punch and you delivered in spades!" Toji Suzuhara said with an equally wide grin, his wife having a spent party-popper in her hands too. A few technicians and a couple of soldiers filled the apartment as the tables had been set up to hold a few choice selections of food.
Somehow, the image of him relaxing while playing the cello and drinking wine, all the while waiting for his dinner to finish cooking evaporated into oblivion.
"Uh..." Shinji looked around the smiling faces, a bit lost, and then grinned awkwardly. "Thanks?"
Cheers were accompanied by the opening of the wine bottles.
Amidst the hooting and the cheering, he wondered about Rei.
Had she not been invited, or had she decided not to come?
When Shinji opened his eyes, he was inside a pristine white room with an equally pearl-colored ceiling, a few neon lights shining brightly overhead. The room was large, but mostly empty. It looked and felt like a hospital room, but someone had apparently emptied it of everything except for the essentials. There wasn't even a clock, and nobody had bothered bringing his cellphone to his side during his sleep.
A whip of light coming like a flash, how ironic that his mind suddenly remembered it. He half-choked at the memory, at the feeling of having his head severed and of the blood pumping out of his neck.
No, he hadn't fallen asleep.
He had been beheaded.
And then he had gotten better.
"It makes sense from a biological point of view," Shinji mumbled. "Like starfishes, although they possess a humanoid body it does not mean their brain must be in their head location. Unless the core is damaged, every other limb shouldn't hold a particular importance...and the head is most definitely a limb," he awkwardly looked around once more. He was talking to himself.
"Great," he grumbled. Holding on to the IV-Drip by his arm, he stood awkwardly up from the hospital bed and began to look around for his clothes. He was feeling sort of breezy, but somehow he had expected it.
The door slid open with a soft hiss, and just outside two guards holding actual and honest-to-god assault rifles looked at him from the sides. They weren't pointing them at him, of course, but had them simply slung around their necks and held near their chests.
"I woke up," Shinji said as if that explained everything.
A few minutes later and a doctor gave him the clear bill of health, handed him back his personal effects and then he was out and about the streets of Tokyo-Three with a very non-suspicious person following him just a few steps behind.
He didn't understand why he needed a bodyguard of all things. Who'd ever want to target him so soon after the Angel's attack, and for what reason? He was one of the pilots that protected the world from Angels, wasn't he? All of this security-was it really needed?
Still, with his pondering he managed to avoid the crowd of people going in the opposite direction. Tokyo-Three was brimming with life now, the evacuation having ended on a positive note with the damage in the process of being repaired already. He could have hailed a cab, but he preferred to walk amidst people. It helped to close the gap, to look at others, see them going about their daily lives. The happy couple that held each other's arms and spoke animatedly, two kids running one after the other, a few businessmen walking with cellphones near their ears, and much more was all laid bare to Shinji's eyes.
This was humanity, and these were the people he had protected.
It made him feel...important.
His cellphone began to buzz, and as he popped it open, he heard a familiar voice, "Excuse me, professor-I'm sorry if I'm being a bother, but-"
"Ah, yes? What is the problem now? Professor Einzberg is being troublesome? I see, I see, now the thesis-look, I'm currently outside right now, can't hear you well," Shinji retorted, finding a quiet spot by the side of the bustling street. "You can't understand why saline solutions are better than distilled water in bacteria cultures? Seriously? Bacterial cells burst in hypo-tonic solutions due to the difference in osmotic pressure between the inside and the outside. Yes, they do need a isotonic solution to keep them from bursting, and it should be tailored to the specific bacteria-seawater bacteria? Well, sterilized seawater-"
Shinji sighed as the stammering student went on a bit. The poor young man -not so younger than him- must have been truly traumatized by professor Einzberg's modus operandi. "Yes, notes are a fundamental part of a thesis research-well, if it were easy, everyone would do it. Since it's not easy, only a few can."
"I'm sorry for bothering you, professor," the student said in the end. "I'll send you something to make up for it. I promise."
"Send me a photo of you graduating with honors then," Shinji answered with a light chuckle. "That's all that I ask."
The conversation ended a scant few seconds later after goodbyes, and with a dreadful sense of longing and nostalgia, Professor Shinji Ikari walked back into the bustling streets, headed for the closest wine shop he could find. He was finishing the wine, and he needed to buy more.
"The Nerv-Card can also be used for purchases outside of the headquarters, right?" Shinji asked the 'non suspicious at all' guard, who nodded. The poor bloke was wearing the most casual of outfits, and if it weren't for the fact that he had greeted Shinji before leaving the hospital, even he wouldn't have guessed he was a bodyguard. "Very well then," Shinji entered, with quite the resolution, the first shop he came across.
When he stepped out, he had a thick carton paper bag with two wine bottles carefully wrapped inside to prevent them from breaking up. If he could get his hands on a piece of fillet, he might have the perfect dinner to celebrate his 'not-death'.
He didn't get his hands on fillet, which was a shame. He did get his hands on some type of fish that required a second trip to the wine shop to get a white wine, and then finally he could head for home with a content whistling to his lips. The moment he opened the door and stepped inside, it was only his natural reaction of tightening the hold over his bags that prevented him from outright throwing the stuff in the air at the sudden noise.
"Congratulations on your victory, Shinji!" Major Katsuragi said cheerfully as she popped one of those carton party-poppers that released strings and colorful glittering pieces of paper -that would be a hassle to clean up later.
"Yeah man! I asked for a punch and you delivered in spades!" Toji Suzuhara said with an equally wide grin, his wife having a spent party-popper in her hands too. A few technicians and a couple of soldiers filled the apartment as the tables had been set up to hold a few choice selections of food.
Somehow, the image of him relaxing while playing the cello and drinking wine, all the while waiting for his dinner to finish cooking evaporated into oblivion.
"Uh..." Shinji looked around the smiling faces, a bit lost, and then grinned awkwardly. "Thanks?"
Cheers were accompanied by the opening of the wine bottles.
Amidst the hooting and the cheering, he wondered about Rei.
Had she not been invited, or had she decided not to come?
- Location
- italy
The invitation was sent to Yui Ikari.
The big giant robot decided not to comment on this.
Mizu
Software Developer
- Location
- Victoria, Australia
> "Like starfishes, although they possess a humanoid body it does not mean their brain must be in their head location.
starfish
> "The Nerv-Card can also be used for purchases outside of the headquarters, right?" Shinji asked the 'non suspicious at all' guard, who nodded.
the 'not suspicious at all' guard
I think Shinji would've preferred his white wine and musical instrument relaxation, somehow.
starfish
> "The Nerv-Card can also be used for purchases outside of the headquarters, right?" Shinji asked the 'non suspicious at all' guard, who nodded.
the 'not suspicious at all' guard
I think Shinji would've preferred his white wine and musical instrument relaxation, somehow.
Chapter Eleven:"Post prandial"
- Location
- https://discord.gg/z9tBvbh
Chapter Eleven:"Post prandial"
The party winded down only after midnight, and by the time everyone had left, Shinji Ikari still had to clean up the mess. A drunken Major remained fast asleep on his sofa, an empty bottle of wine in her arms as Penpen had somehow decided to make his 'pillow' his nest, and was softly snoring.
He dropped a spare sheet over the woman's form, and then headed for a quick shower before bed.
The next morning, he woke up to the sound of his kitchen being assaulted. Somehow, the sight of a Major in her underwear changed absolutely nothing to his otherwise half-asleep and half-shocked expression.
"Hello there~" Major Katsuragi said with a cheerful wave, "This is service for the-"
"Please, get dressed," Shinji groaned, closing his eyes and looking away.
The woman had the galls to chuckle, "Well, sure. Didn't know you swung that way-"
Without further coaxing, the Major did get dressed. Shinji sighed in relief as he began to prepare breakfast, and by the time he was done, he had two plates set on the table. "I'm no Madam Suzuhara," Shinji said, "But anyway-here."
"Thanks for the meal," Misato said cheerfully, grabbing her chopsticks and starting to eat greedily. "Man-this is great!" she said. "Is there any beer?"
"No," Shinji replied, shaking his head as he began to eat slowly.
"What? Why not?! There should always be a beer in the house!" Misato pointed out. "How can you not have any beer in your fridge? Or your house? Or your heart, even!"
The Major was quite loud even in the mornings, apparently. No matter the amount of alcohol she had drunk, she seemed to always be ready to imbue more. Was she a Klein bottle? Well, a Klein bottle filled with beer. A Saké bottle that was a Klein field.
Uh, the Klein-Beer effect.
"Because I don't like beer?" Shinji answered. "I'd rather have a glass of wine-and not in the morning."
"What an uptight pilot," Misato said with a snort. "At least you won't drink and drive. Wouldn't want any accident with a drunken pilot!" she grinned cheerfully at that, finishing her rice and bringing the cup over, "Seconds!"
Shinji sighed, and did just that. "Here, here," he mumbled. "Are you always this...pushy?"
"Yes," Misato said with a soft smile. "I've grown my fair share of kids."
"I'm sorry," Shinji said, making the Major frown, "But I fail to see the connection."
"You just looked like the lonely sort," Misato said with a shrug. "Thought you could use a cheering up. God knows how much I needed one after the last Angel fight. It's-what you did, you know it's really a big deal, right?"
"I know," Shinji answered with a shrug. "I saved mankind. Well, I guess. It keeps not feeling real, but then I remember the pain, the smell of blood-and it all comes back to me."
"When the third Angel was defeated, it took its toll on the city, on the people, and-some questionable methods were used to stop it. The losses in civilian lives were staggering. Most of the people that now work in Nerv, they're there because they want revenge-hell...I think 'revenge' is perhaps the only reason some of us wake up in the morning," her smile remained light as she began to eat her second portion of rice. "What I'm trying to say is that I've seen the brats grow up into fine soldiers, I've seen their hurt, and I can pick it up pretty quickly. You're lucky your father's still alive-"
"Misato," Shinji said softly, "Please don't push your luck." He tried not to make his voice sound cold, but he failed. "I've already made peace with that man," more like, he began no new conflicts.
"Really? Then I guess you'd have no qualms having dinner with him," Misato grinned, and Shinji blinked.
"What."
"Right, right, I know I haven't been doing my job recently, but hey, we might have died after this Angel, so I wanted to die happy, and alcohol is happiness-anyway! That said, last night was the party of us grunts, tonight is the party of the 'higher ups'. Hope you've got a suit ready," she winked. "And how are your dancing skills?"
"Dancing...skills?" Shinji wasn't really understanding half of what the woman was saying, but he knew he should feel slightly pissed off by the way she wasn't giving it any thought.
"Indeed, the Prime Minister wants to personally greet the heroes and the Commander, so think of it as a necessary part of the job," Misato chided him, nodding most wisely as she finished her breakfast in the end.
Shinji took a small breath. "I'll need a suit."
"Yep, and a date too," Misato answered. "Unless you'd like to bring me?" she fluttered her eyelids.
"Sure," Shinji shrugged. Misato nodded, closing her eyes. She opened them wide soon after, and stared at Shinji. "It's not like I know anyone I could bring-"
"You could ask Rei," Misato said. "That lonely girl-that pilot, you know, blue hair, red eyes, has a hate boner for Ritsuko the size of the moon since she married her teenager crush-"
Shinji opened his mouth, then connected the dots, and then choked on his spit. "W-W-WHAT!?"
"You didn't know? Come on, be the rebound guy, get the booty-isn't that what a true hot-blooded man would-"
"Major Misato," Shinji said quite frankly, "If this is an attempt to cheer me up, then you are awfully misunderstanding my character-I do not need 'booty' to cheer up."
"I understood that by shaking my underwear-clad ass and receiving no appreciative whistles," Misato said, hanging her head low in disbelief. "What I wanted to say is...she could use a friend, that girl. And you're a pilot, and her crush's son, so-perhaps she'd let you get close enough?"
Shinji furrowed his brows in thought as he began to pick up the empty plates and put them in the sink. "I can't believe I'm actually getting convinced by this argument."
Misato chuckled softly.
"I'll ask, but I make no promises."
"Don't worry, if she says no, I'll call shotgun."
"Aren't you already invited?"
"Yes, but if I can go with another date, I might get lucky~"
Shinji shuddered. "Why are you telling...no, why are you like this?"
Misato's smile turned awkward. "When you end up wise like me," Penpen took that as the cue to 'Wark' quite snarkily, "With only an asshole pet penguin as company," she shook her head, "Then you start looking around and building couples."
Misato smiled. "I'm a naval yard. I build ships."
Shinji did not understand what the Major was saying, but aptly chose not to dig deeper.
One should never 'tap' madness.
Madness had the bad habit of 'tapping' right back.
The party winded down only after midnight, and by the time everyone had left, Shinji Ikari still had to clean up the mess. A drunken Major remained fast asleep on his sofa, an empty bottle of wine in her arms as Penpen had somehow decided to make his 'pillow' his nest, and was softly snoring.
He dropped a spare sheet over the woman's form, and then headed for a quick shower before bed.
The next morning, he woke up to the sound of his kitchen being assaulted. Somehow, the sight of a Major in her underwear changed absolutely nothing to his otherwise half-asleep and half-shocked expression.
"Hello there~" Major Katsuragi said with a cheerful wave, "This is service for the-"
"Please, get dressed," Shinji groaned, closing his eyes and looking away.
The woman had the galls to chuckle, "Well, sure. Didn't know you swung that way-"
Without further coaxing, the Major did get dressed. Shinji sighed in relief as he began to prepare breakfast, and by the time he was done, he had two plates set on the table. "I'm no Madam Suzuhara," Shinji said, "But anyway-here."
"Thanks for the meal," Misato said cheerfully, grabbing her chopsticks and starting to eat greedily. "Man-this is great!" she said. "Is there any beer?"
"No," Shinji replied, shaking his head as he began to eat slowly.
"What? Why not?! There should always be a beer in the house!" Misato pointed out. "How can you not have any beer in your fridge? Or your house? Or your heart, even!"
The Major was quite loud even in the mornings, apparently. No matter the amount of alcohol she had drunk, she seemed to always be ready to imbue more. Was she a Klein bottle? Well, a Klein bottle filled with beer. A Saké bottle that was a Klein field.
Uh, the Klein-Beer effect.
"Because I don't like beer?" Shinji answered. "I'd rather have a glass of wine-and not in the morning."
"What an uptight pilot," Misato said with a snort. "At least you won't drink and drive. Wouldn't want any accident with a drunken pilot!" she grinned cheerfully at that, finishing her rice and bringing the cup over, "Seconds!"
Shinji sighed, and did just that. "Here, here," he mumbled. "Are you always this...pushy?"
"Yes," Misato said with a soft smile. "I've grown my fair share of kids."
"I'm sorry," Shinji said, making the Major frown, "But I fail to see the connection."
"You just looked like the lonely sort," Misato said with a shrug. "Thought you could use a cheering up. God knows how much I needed one after the last Angel fight. It's-what you did, you know it's really a big deal, right?"
"I know," Shinji answered with a shrug. "I saved mankind. Well, I guess. It keeps not feeling real, but then I remember the pain, the smell of blood-and it all comes back to me."
"When the third Angel was defeated, it took its toll on the city, on the people, and-some questionable methods were used to stop it. The losses in civilian lives were staggering. Most of the people that now work in Nerv, they're there because they want revenge-hell...I think 'revenge' is perhaps the only reason some of us wake up in the morning," her smile remained light as she began to eat her second portion of rice. "What I'm trying to say is that I've seen the brats grow up into fine soldiers, I've seen their hurt, and I can pick it up pretty quickly. You're lucky your father's still alive-"
"Misato," Shinji said softly, "Please don't push your luck." He tried not to make his voice sound cold, but he failed. "I've already made peace with that man," more like, he began no new conflicts.
"Really? Then I guess you'd have no qualms having dinner with him," Misato grinned, and Shinji blinked.
"What."
"Right, right, I know I haven't been doing my job recently, but hey, we might have died after this Angel, so I wanted to die happy, and alcohol is happiness-anyway! That said, last night was the party of us grunts, tonight is the party of the 'higher ups'. Hope you've got a suit ready," she winked. "And how are your dancing skills?"
"Dancing...skills?" Shinji wasn't really understanding half of what the woman was saying, but he knew he should feel slightly pissed off by the way she wasn't giving it any thought.
"Indeed, the Prime Minister wants to personally greet the heroes and the Commander, so think of it as a necessary part of the job," Misato chided him, nodding most wisely as she finished her breakfast in the end.
Shinji took a small breath. "I'll need a suit."
"Yep, and a date too," Misato answered. "Unless you'd like to bring me?" she fluttered her eyelids.
"Sure," Shinji shrugged. Misato nodded, closing her eyes. She opened them wide soon after, and stared at Shinji. "It's not like I know anyone I could bring-"
"You could ask Rei," Misato said. "That lonely girl-that pilot, you know, blue hair, red eyes, has a hate boner for Ritsuko the size of the moon since she married her teenager crush-"
Shinji opened his mouth, then connected the dots, and then choked on his spit. "W-W-WHAT!?"
"You didn't know? Come on, be the rebound guy, get the booty-isn't that what a true hot-blooded man would-"
"Major Misato," Shinji said quite frankly, "If this is an attempt to cheer me up, then you are awfully misunderstanding my character-I do not need 'booty' to cheer up."
"I understood that by shaking my underwear-clad ass and receiving no appreciative whistles," Misato said, hanging her head low in disbelief. "What I wanted to say is...she could use a friend, that girl. And you're a pilot, and her crush's son, so-perhaps she'd let you get close enough?"
Shinji furrowed his brows in thought as he began to pick up the empty plates and put them in the sink. "I can't believe I'm actually getting convinced by this argument."
Misato chuckled softly.
"I'll ask, but I make no promises."
"Don't worry, if she says no, I'll call shotgun."
"Aren't you already invited?"
"Yes, but if I can go with another date, I might get lucky~"
Shinji shuddered. "Why are you telling...no, why are you like this?"
Misato's smile turned awkward. "When you end up wise like me," Penpen took that as the cue to 'Wark' quite snarkily, "With only an asshole pet penguin as company," she shook her head, "Then you start looking around and building couples."
Misato smiled. "I'm a naval yard. I build ships."
Shinji did not understand what the Major was saying, but aptly chose not to dig deeper.
One should never 'tap' madness.
Madness had the bad habit of 'tapping' right back.
Science
If you're reading this, omae wa mo shindeiru.
- Location
- Killeen, TX
This line, this line is my line.
- Location
- Poland
What a good... perverted samaritan.
Line of the year, right here.