Super-Wackos of EVA: NERV Gets Smart

[Author0fntent]

*Disclaimer: I own nothing of Gainax, Khara, NBC, CBS, Warner Bros., or any of the characters and ideas of Misters Melvin Kaminsky and Henry Zuckerman. No celebrities were harmed in the making of this fanfic.*

Prologue 1 - The In Media Res Affair
​

The announcement from Dr. Akagi signaled the end of yet another sync test session for Shinji and his fellow Evangelion pilots, along with the test plug being emptied of LCL. Once out of the plug, and having coughed up whatever LCL was still in him, Shinji, along with Asuka and Rei, walked to their respective locker rooms to cleanse themselves of any lingering goop. (While Rei was indifferent, Asuka and Shinji especially hated being caked in dried LCL, hence their underlying constant eagerness for the showers at the end of each testing session.) Once all three pilots were adequately squeaky clean enough, they returned to the Pribnow Box that faced the testing facility, where Dr. Akagi and Misato briefed them on their scores this round. Unsurprisingly, and with the boast that followed, Asuka was top of the heap, with Shinji second, and Rei last. After being dismissed for the day, the trio of pilots made their way towards one of NERV's exits back up to the surface of Tokyo-3.

Along the way, Shinji stopped at one point, telling the girls to go on ahead of him, saying that he'd just remembered leaving something in his locker. Not bothering with asking what specifically, Asuka and Rei kept going, while Shinji, as soon as he determined that they were far enough from his sight, dropped his signature meek look as he straightened himself up, and turned in the opposite direction, quietly and carefully making his way to where his true destination was: Dr. Akagi's office. On the way, any time he passed by members of NERV's staff, he quickly resumed his more slumped, meek disposition; by now he'd cultivated something of a reputation among the lower-tier staff members as the 'mope' of the three pilots, so no one batted an eye as they briefly noticed Shinji passing them by. Unfortunately, given how many people worked down in the Geofront that served as NERV-Central's headquarters, Shinji had to swap between 'masks' so much that he felt as if his facial muscles were experiencing mood whiplash. Thankfully, he finally reached the office of NERV's overall scientific head, and here was where the hard part of his 'errand' began.

Taking a brief moment to eye the security cameras that faced the door while remaining out of their sight, Shinji raised and aimed his wristwatch--a device he heard the Chief once describe as something a Dick Tracy (whoever that was) would be proud of--in their direction. After selecting the appropriate command on the watch face's screen, he pressed the button on the side and beamed a signal into each camera--one that reprogrammed them to play a loop of the hallway outside Akagi's door using footage that had been uploaded at the same time. Once confirmed that the loops were running, Shinji walked up to the door and proceeded to remove from his backpack the next gizmo for his purposes: what Bruce and Lloyd had named the "anycard". Having managed to successfully 'clone' Dr. Akagi's access/ID card earlier, Shinji swiped the anycard into the reader, which opened the door to the office without incident; as an added bonus, the card also released a program that erased whatever 'footprints' were left by it in the access log overseen by NERV's central supercomputer, the MAGI.

Once the door closed behind him, Shinji slipped on a pair of plastic gloves and began searching the office. He did a double-take on realizing that he was being 'watched' by a black cat that was curled up on top of a filing cabinet in one corner of the office. Having anticipated this ahead of time thanks to some earlier 'recon' he'd done, he opened a small pocket of his backpack and took out a small cat treat, which he then tossed up towards the cat. The cat caught the treat in its mouth on instinct, and soon the effects of the specially-prepared delicacy began to take effect, lulling the creature into quite the long 'cat nap'. Once he heard the purring that approximated a cat's snoring, Shinji breathed a brief sigh of relief and returned to his main task. It was then that he noticed on Dr. Akagi's desk just the items he was looking for: a set of decorative cat-shaped salt-and-pepper shakers (white for the salt, black for the pepper, naturally). A small grin on his face, he quietly walked up to the desk, and removed yet another item from his backpack. While the object in question looked like a typical pack of Smarties candy, the contents of said pack were far from edible. Unwrapping the pack, he took out one of the tiny pastel-colored discs with one hand, and used the other to lift the head/lid of the salt shaker off; he then placed the disc inside the 'body' and put the lid back on, ensuring that it looked as if it hadn't been moved at all. What he'd just put inside was, in fact, a new type of listening device Bruce and Lloyd and come up with that was completely undetectable to the current bug-sweeping devices available, mainly thanks to its lack of overly-metal components.

His job done, Shinji quickly, but quietly opened the door, exited the office, and closed it just as fast, before getting as far away from Akagi's office as swiftly as possible. Managing to avoid a number of personnel along the way, as soon as Shinji reached the tram that would take him topside, he slumped in his seat with relief, thankful that the tram was empty. Accessing another feature of his watch, he soon opened a line of communication to his handler.

"86 to 99--mission accomplished," he reported quietly. "The cat's come down with a bug."

"...How long were you workshopping that one?" the voice on the other end, 99, posed incredulously.

"Eh...oooohhh...*Sigh* Would you believe...the entire time I was en route to Akagi's office?" Shinji replied. "I mean, cut me a little slack, I'm still trying to get the hang of 'post-mission quipping'."

"For now, I wouldn't worry too much about your quipping," 99 advised. "Even so, good job, 86. Return home, and we'll contact you with your next assignment. Besides, any longer and your housemates might riot over a lack of their prized chef and his five-star dinners."

"Heh--good point," Shinji said. "And thanks, 99. Over and out."

End of Prologue.​

 

[Author0fntent]

Prologue 2 - The Title Song Affair

"Ladies and gentlemen, the next best thing to "Weird Al" Yankovic, Mister Mark Jonathan Davis."


View: https://youtu.be/c3DdEEE6KPE?si=AEQzr-q9BtPziLgJ

A boy who's averse
to the word 'destiny'...
Always has places he knows
where he'd rather be...

Third Child's the name he hates,
but he's gotta play his part...
'Cause if he's gonna win,
He's gotta Get Smaaaaarrrrt!

A boy up against
such sinister foes...
He's in over his head,
so he stays on his toes...

He must be subtle,
can't upset the apple cart...
'Cause if he's gonna spy,
He's gotta Get Smaaaaarrrrrt!

Heeeeee'll perservere,
As the Angels keep making landfall...
Heeeee will not ruuuuunnn...
'Cause where else could he flee to?
He's gotta see this through!
He simply must answer the call...

Facing death all the time
Is a tough job for such a kid...
Still he seems like he's capable--
Have we asked him? 'Course we did...[Looks side-to-side suspiciously.]

By the way, if you logged on late,
Indulge me while I just restate--
That EVA's crossing over...
with Get Smaaarrrt!

That's right, it's Get Smaaaarrrt!
The spy spoof Get Smaaaarrrt!
NGE and Get Smaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrt!

*KABLOOIE!*
​

Shinji, astonished, poked his head out from the left side, uneasily marveling at the aftermath of the spectacle that just transpired.

Shinji: ".......Wow. Never knew anyone could hold that note for so long.....Ummm....can we get a mop in here?"

 

[Author0fntent]

Chapter 1 - The Introspection-Leads-To-New-Opportunity-Knocking-Affair​

On a rainy morning in Tokyo-3, Shinji Ikari sat on a maglev train, sulking with his earbuds plugged in, his trusty SDAT player helping him tune out the world around him as usual. His duffel bag, filled with everything to his name (except his cello, no way he could lug that thing around with him all the time), sat on a rack above him.

It had been a short while since his battle with the Fourth Angel, Shamshel, and it proved to be the last straw for him. All the pressure, the pain, the violence that came with piloting an Evangelion--after just two Angels, it just was too much for him. It was no wonder that, while Misato was still asleep, he quietly packed up his things, wrote a short letter for his guardian-slash-immediate commanding officer, and left it, along with his NERV ID card, on the desk in his room, before quietly leaving her apartment. From there, he soon made his way to the strain station, hopped the next one to come in, and was soon riding the rails in his own little world, just as he'd done when he'd come into Tokyo-3 the same way only a month or so before.

"次は長大峠、ながおとうげです。" the female-sounding electronic voice informed over the speaker system in the train car. "出口は右側に切り替わります。"

Shinji paid the announcement no mind, oblivious to his surroundings as he continued stewing in his own despair, even as the crowd size on the train changed with each stop, until finally, he was all alone on the car as it reached its last station. He'd been on the train the entire day, unmoving, and it was now already dark.

"平素より第三東京環状7号線をご利用いただき誠にありがとうございます。" an electronic male voice sounded over the speaker system, stirring Shinji from his brooding as he finally lifted his head up. "この電車はこの駅で運休します。 皆様もお降りの際は忘れ物がないかご確認ください。"

"…戻らなければなりません。" Shinji quietly muttered to himself. It was then that he heard the speaker system crackle to life again, to his slight confusion.

"Attention. Attention," the same electronic male voice sounded, having unexpectedly switched languages. "Ladies and gentlemen: in the interest of clarity--and sanity--and because there wasn't any room in the budget for subtitles, the rest of this story will be dubbed into English (or whichever language this story is being read in). Thank you, and have a nice day."

Shinji, momentarily befuddled by the strange announcement he'd just heard, shrugged, got his bag from the rack above him, and exited the train before continuing on his aimless wandering. Thankfully, the rain had stopped, and he could walk without fear of getting soaked. It was while he walked that, in lieu of rewinding his tape yet again, he decided to slip into a monologue, one only audible to us.

"Woe...is...me," he began. "...Tokyo-3 can be a lonely place on a Saturday night--except it's Thursday evening." He paused in thought for a moment. Compared to me, Amuro Ray was having the time of his own life. "No good came of me piloting a twenty-story-tall war machine." I feel like the worn-out bow of a cello that hasn't been strung in years. "I'd jump into Lake Ashi, but it looks like rain." He let out a brief, but sad chuckle before he finished with a refrain of "No good came of me piloting a twenty-story-tall war machine..."

Moments later, he found himself in a seat in the upper left-most row of a movie theater, just as the projector lit up and began the show on the big screen. Soon, Shinji and the miniscule audience in the theater were greeted with the sight of a variety of simple, abstract, geometric shapes that moved and morphed to the sounds of the French Suite (BWV 816) by Johann Sebastian Bach (a composer Shinji was very familiar with), played on a harpsichord.

"...What the heck is this?" Shinji found himself pondering aloud, a slightly-baffled expression on his face. "I mean, it's a cartoon, yes, but seriously, what is it?" Shinji soon found himself shushed by another audience member. When the next 'scene' came on, Shinji's questioning resumed. "Umm....is this some sort of birth? I mean, it looks like it, if I remember biology class right...Annnd, it's born, whatever it is, it's born--look out!! Annnd, too late, it's dead already." The scene then shifted to black, before the next sequence began, as it focused on a round object surrounded by little dots amid a purple background. "Huh--what's this? Looks...cute, I guess? Okay, looks cute, this is nice--what the heck is it?" The shape then morphed again while the background soon became two-tone and two-colored. "Oh-kay, now I think I know what this is--it's boring, is what it is. What little money I had, paid for some French movie, for a foreign movie. Now I'm seeing this...stuff." The scene shifted again, this time to a blue background and what looked to be a clump of black squiggles on the right-hand side. "...Now we've got a bug, or something." Soon a similar clump of squiggles began to form on the left-hand side of the screen, only with the tips of each strand now sporting dots at the end. The two objects then began moving towards each other. "Oh-okay, those two things, they...they like each other, or something? I mean, they look like they're in love, maybe?" The clump on the right then sported its own set of dots on the tips of each strand. "Oh, now I get it, the right one was jealous or something of the other one." The two clumps then moved towards the center of the screen, until they were overlapping. "...Is this supposed to be a sex scene or something? I'm sure I didn't walk into one of those kinds of theaters..."

"Hey, would you shut up already?!" the female half of a young couple whisper-shouted at Shinji.

"Give me a break!" Shinji hissed back. "I'm fifteen years old, I don't have that much of an attention span to care enough about movies like this, so excuse me for asking legitimate questions about what it is I'm seeing on-screen."

The scene then shifted as a new sequence began. "...What's with the dots? Are they eyes? Are they anything?...Must be another bit of symbolism. Of what, who knows?" The scene then saw an oblong shape appear, only for it to be dotted with little pointy appendages of varying sizes all around its circumference. "...Now we've got another bug of some kind? Almost looks like a cockroach. *Pfff* Good luck in dealing with it, I don't envy you for having to contend with this kind of pest. (Why did I spend good money to see a cockroach, again?)" The scene then shifted again, this time with a new batch of shapes on-screen. "Huh--these look like lips." The scene then changed again. "I can't tell if this movie's supposed to be weird, dirty...or weirdly dirty, I don't know..."

Shinji found himself once again shushed, and clearly he could confirm it came from that same female half of the young couple who, along with himself, an old man resting his feet on the back of another seat, another old man sleeping in the space between rows, and a salaryman reading a book while reclining, made up the audience in the theater. "Don't you 'shush' me, lady."

"Quiet, will ya?" the male half of the couple finally sounded.

"...I still don't know what to think of this," Shinji muttered, ignoring the previous remark. "I mean, whoever made this, must've been good in film school if they let them make this, right?...Why'd they waste their time on this? I mean, they could've made the next Star Wars, something big--or at least make something for Disney. (*Sigh* Good money down the drain for me...)" Shinji then got up, bag in-hand, and proceeded to exit the theater. "I don't know much about psychoanalysis, but I'd say this movie has no idea what it is at all." From there, Shinji made his way to the lobby, found a couch next to a vending machine, and laid down on it, using his duffel bag as a pillow.

The next morning found Shinji resuming his wandering about the city, lost in his own conflicting thoughts, alone, and a whole myriad of other feelings swirling about him as he walked. The sky was aglow with an almost violent (not violet!) shade of red, and the sounds of cicadas climbed upwards in tone and pitch. Shinji, as he walked, warily looked around, a hint of fright on his features. He covered his ears, trying his best to block out the sounds of the insects as they got louder. Finally, unwilling to put up with them, Shinji ran, wanting to just go and hop a bus and get out of the city as soon as possible. It was at that moment that the sounds of the cicadas were suddenly replaced with something less oppressive, as Shinji soon heard a car coming closer towards him.

"Shinji? Shinji Ikari, is that you?" he heard the driver call out as the car--or rather, minivan--pulled up.

"AGH!" Shinji cried out as he jumped in fear before wildly waving off whoever it was with his hands. "Don't with the abducting, and the imperiling, and the stranger danger--!"

"...Wait, what?" the driver said confusedly. "Shinji, it's okay, I'm not going to kidnap you."

Shinji, settling down a bit, slowly opened one eye, before doing the same with the other, and took a look at who was speaking to him. Sitting in the driver's seat of the minivan was a brown-eyed young woman of about 19, sporting a concerned look on her freckled, bespectacled face. Her dark brown hair was done in two low-hanging ponytails, and she was wearing a white collared blouse with the sleeves rolled up to her elbows, a pair of knee-high shorts, and black Converse sneakers. It was her freckles, however, that stirred something in Shinji's memory.

"Um...have we met before?" he asked.

The young woman's lips became a small smile before she answered him. "We have--you dropped off a small stack of printouts with my sister when she was out sick from school a few weeks back. You might know her--Hikari Horaki?"

Things finally cleared up for Shinji on hearing that name. "Oh, yeah, now I remember--you're Kodama, the oldest, right?"

Kodama nodded. "You got it." Her concerned look then made a return. "Shinji, what are you doing out here? Shouldn't you be in school right now?"

"It's...well...it's just that..." Shinji started to stammer out. "*Sigh* It's a long story. I don't know if you'd want to hear it."

Kodama's small smile reappeared before she spoke. "Well, this might be the former class rep in me talking, but I'd be willing to listen. My shift at work doesn't start for a couple of hours, so I have time. And besides, it might do you a little good to talk with someone. (And I'm not just saying this because I'm studying psychology.) Also, have you had breakfast yet?"

Before Shinji could offer up an excuse, his stomach chose that moment to growl. "Eh-heh..." Shinji uttered sheepishly, his cheeks turning a tinge of pink.

Kodama paid his mild embarrassment no mind as she opened the minivan's passenger-side door. "Hop in--I know a place that serves good grub."

Shinji, a bit hesitant, was about to politely turn her down before his stomach growled again, almost insistently this time. "All right, all right, you win..." Shinji muttered quietly while looking down at his gut, as he walked over and got into the proffered seat, tossed his bag behind it, and buckled the seatbelt.

-X-​

Meanwhile, in a field of susuki somewhere on the outskirts of the city, one Kensuke Aida, garbed in a set of BDUs, was engaged in a one-man session of war games, seemingly without a care in the world as he gunned down imaginary enemies, only to 'fall in battle'. After a few moments of playing dead, he picked himself up and walked to his 'base camp', where he'd log in another session of practicing his survival skills. All in all, a typical start to the weekend for the otaku when it comes to all things tech, military, or mecha--or some combination of all three.

-X-​

A short drive later, Shinji and Kodama were seated in a booth at a diner on the other side of Tokyo-3's downtown, the former contentedly eating a hearty meal of scrambled eggs, sausage, and rye toast, a glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice present to help him wash it all down. The latter was well-set with an omelet, hash browns, and a glass of juice of her own, along with a cup of coffee. Their meal was a mostly-quiet affair, though Kodama did make attempts at small-talk, and got a few responses from Shinji in turn. Finally, once their plates were cleaned off, Kodama decided to try getting him to open up again.

"Enjoy the food?" she asked, breaking the ice a bit gently.

Shinji nodded. "Usually I don't eat out at places like this, but I haven't been in the city that long, so I guess I just overlooked it."

"Yeah, some of these spots tend to be a bit hole-in-the-wall," Kodama said, "but it's usually the holes-in-the-wall that turn out to be hidden gems. Anyway--about that long story you mentioned..." Shinji grew a bit apprehensive on hearing that, only to be met with a reassuring gesture from the college girl. "As I said earlier, I'm studying psychology, and I'm a firm believer in doctor-patient confidentiality. And I used to be a class rep--we didn't just keep things orderly in the classroom, we were there for our classmates to talk to if they had problems. Kind of runs in the family, actually--aside from Hikari and myself, our mom was a class rep, her mom was a class rep, her mom's mom was a--you get the idea. (Despite how much she denies it, once she hits middle school, our littlest sister, Nozomi, will be giving off that air of matronly authority without fail...) So, indulge me a little--like I said, it might do you a some good to talk with someone, something I imagine you haven't done a lot of since starting your 'after-school job'."

Shinji was about to politely decline, until her words made him realize something. "Wait, you know I'm a--?"

"Evangelion pilot?" Kodama finished. "Yep. Kensuke Aida's been a friend of Hikari's since grade school, and according to her, the rumor mill went into overdrive when he made you accidentally 'out' yourself--plus, given how the elementary school where Nozomi attends is right next door, the rumor mill spills over from the middle school to there pretty often, so when Nozomi came home one day saying how the pilot of the 'giant robot' that fought the first big monster a couple of months ago was in our sister's class, and given how said pilot had been described as a 'shy introvert' in-person, once you came to our doorstep to give Hikari those printouts, it didn't take long for me to figure things out." Shinji gave her an astonished look on hearing her deduction. "Like I said, as someone aspiring to be a psychologist, I take doctor-patient confidentiality very seriously, so anything you tell me doesn't leave this booth, which I chose since it's highly eavesdropper-free. Plus, we both get something out of it--you get a little therapy session, and I get a bit of practice in with the skills I'm learning. So, with all that out of the way...how come you looked like you were running away from home when I found you earlier?"

Shinji didn't know what it was, whether it was her honesty or something as simple as her tone of voice, but for some reason, for the first time in a while, he felt like he really could speak freely and without judgement in another person's presence. Maybe there is something to a little therapy...Shinji thought to himself before finally responding. "I...I quit piloting."

Kodama looked a bit perplexed by his statement. "Quit? Why would you?"

"It's just...I..." Shinji began, "...I just can't do it anymore--two Angels is enough. I mean...*Sigh* Let me start at the beginning--a few months ago, I receive a letter from my father, who I've barely spoken to, let alone seen, in ten years, aside from the one brief interaction we usually have on the anniversary of...of my mother's death. The majority of the letter is blacked out, like those top secret documents you see in spy movies or whatever--except for one word: "Come". That's it. No 'Hey, how's it going?', just "Come" and directions to meet someone working for him once I get to Tokyo-3. (Said person wound up being Ms. Misato, my immediate commanding officer and current guardian, though I'm guessing both are rather moot at this point.) I tore that letter up and taped it back together so many times I've lost count (er, my father's letter, not the one Ms. Misato also included, along with a picture of herself--a bit of a 'racy' picture of herself, but I digress)...Eventually, with some 'nudging' from my previous guardian, I packed my things and headed to the city..."

Kodama nodded patiently as she continued to listen. Shinji recounted his first day in Tokyo-3; how he nearly got flattened by the Angel attacking at the time, only to be rescued by Misato and brought to NERV HQ; his seeing Unit-01 and his rather cold reunion with his father, NERV's supreme commander; how he first met Rei Ayanami when she was wheeled out to pilot the robot when Shinji refused; how he wound up getting in it to spare Rei, only to wind up in a terrible first sortie against the Angel that led to the EVA going berserk on the creature; how, after recovering in NERV's medical ward, and after some initial pilot training, he started school, only to accidentally reveal himself as a pilot...and earning the wrath of his classmate Toji Suzuhara, whose little sister, Sakura, had been injured during that first sortie by falling debris; and finally, his recent battle with the second Angel that appeared in the city, which forced him to take both Kensuke and Toji into Unit-01's entry plug since they were outside the shelter for who knows what reason. How that battle took a significant toll on Shinji, who found himself, in his panic, repeatedly ignoring Misato's orders to retreat as the Angel continued to whip and stab his EVA, until he desperately stabbed its core in turn and killed it. How, once the battle ended, while Toji and Kensuke were disciplined by NERV's Section-2, he wound up in a holding cell for insubordination, Misato 'lecturing' him on following chain of command (as well as self-preservation, given his rather nihilistic, yet rude answers after a string of 'yeses').

"...I know I said I'd pilot the EVA, but in truth, I...I really can't. Not after all the pain it's brought me, not after the pain I've inflicted on others--it's just too much for me to handle. So I left...It's probably for the best, anyway. My father didn't want me for anything than just making the EVA work, and even then, they've still got Ayanami, once she gets better. I'm gonna go back, tell my old guardian things didn't work out, and just pick up where I left off. Sure, it'll be an uneventful life, but...it's less painful than what I'll go through if I stay here any longer."

Kodama nodded, before choosing that moment to speak up. "Your old guardian aside, is there anyone else waiting for you? Any friends, maybe?"

Shinji rubbed the back of his head absentmindedly as he answered. "I...wouldn't exactly say 'friends'. More like acquaintances. I did have friends growing up, but just when we were really starting to hang out, they wound up moving away--usually because their parents got some new job somewhere else. (It happened a lot, now that I think about it.) And while my old guardian wasn't the friendliest, at least living with him, things were more...consistent. Routine."

Kodama took a sip of her coffee, and when she put the cup back down on the saucer, she posed a new question to Shinji. "...In all honesty, this sounds like a really depressing existence you're thinking of heading back to--like an indie flick that's trying to be bait for the Oscars or Sundance, but just comes off as imitating said Oscars or Sundance bait. But let me ask you this, Shinji--all those feelings you have, about your own life, being a 'yes-man' to those you interact with, wanting to avoid pain so much you avoid most people in general? What if I told you that...you being who you are right now was by design?"

Shinji's eyes widened with surprise. "B-by design? W-what are you saying?"

Kodama nodded. "Kids your age are only this nihilistic and cynical because they're either going through a goth/emo phase because they're a slave to trends...or, they were brought up in an environment that discourages a large percentage of human contact and encourages negative feelings, to the point where their social skills get stunted." Her eyes narrowed as she continued. "Unfortunately, based on what you've described, you're definitely in the latter camp. I'm saying that you've been deliberately molded by external factors--and external actors--into the sad-sack who just polished off a diner breakfast as if it were the first good meal you'd had in a long time."

Shinji felt his jaw go a bit slack at this revelation. When he took a moment to give it some thought, he realized, uneasily, that what Kodama had said made some sense. "B-but--who'd do this? Why do this? And why me?"

Kodama arched an eyebrow. "Are you sure you want the answers to those questions?"

Shinji hesitated a bit and gave it some more thought, before his curiosity (a very morbid curiosity, at that) ultimately won out. "Y-yes. I want to know."

"...Follow me, then," Kodama said as she got up from the booth, Shinji doing the same as he proceeded to follow her to the door next to the diner's counter that led to the hallway containing the restrooms, janitor's closet, and back office.

View: https://youtu.be/RIe1UQ5fiEM?si=ch9lO-w3spOnLEEg​

"W-where are you taking me?" Shinji asked as they came up to one unmarked door in particular.

"My place of work," Kodama replied as she entered in a code on the keypad under the doorknob: 09-18-65.

Once the keypad beeped and the light turned green, the door unlocked and Kodama opened, it, motioning for Shinji to enter first. Hesitantly, he did so, Kodama behind him as she shut the door. From there, the two walked down a set of stairs that had a red stripe going down the middle, and were soon faced with a set of large steel doors, which opened automatically for them. The two continued on, Shinji warily eying his surroundings, noticing the stripe continued along the floor. They soon passed through a nearly-identical set of doors, then a set that had visible tumblers pulling out as the doors automatically opened. The next door they passed through resembled a series of steel grates overlapping one another that lifted upward (revealing the prongs underneath that fit into the holes below the doorway), followed by another pair of doors that looked like something that would be more fitting of a bank vault. It was while passing through the doors that they accidentally closed on a loose shoelace on Shinji's left shoe, much to his and Kodama's surprise. After taking a moment to pull his lace out of the space between the closed doors, which cost him an aglet in the process, Shinji quickly re-tied his shoe before he and Kodama kept going. They briskly made their way to a similar set of doors that just closed before they could reach them, leading to Kodama needing to enter a four-digit code on the keypad to the right, which opened them back up. Once on the other side, Shinji grew further surprised by the lone object in the room:

An old-style phone booth, silver with red trim, the word 'Telephone' printed in white, English letters on the top (and in three other languages, Japanese one of them, on the other three sides of the top). Kodama slid open the door to the booth and bade for Shinji to enter, which he did before she followed him in and slid it closed. She then picked up the phone and reached into her pocket, only to notice something off and then pat her other pockets as if searching for something.

"Ah, shoot," she muttered before facing Shinji, a bit of a sheepish expression on her face. "This is a bit embarrassing, but would you have any change on you?" Shinji fumbled around in his own pockets before checking one on his duffel bag and hitting paydirt. He handed the coins to Kodama, who only took the required amount and gave the rest back to him. "Thanks--don't worry, you'll be reimbursed." She then dropped the coins into the phone's slot and dialed a certain number, before hanging the phone back up. Once done, Shinji suddenly felt the floor beneath them shudder, and soon saw, to his own astonishment, that they were being slowly lowered downwards. Once past a short shaft, Shinji's astonishment grew further as he took in what he was seeing while he and Kodama passed each level in the odd elevator. On one level were men and women at computer stations, going over data of some kind; another, he noticed, had a shooting range on one half and a fighting dojo on the other, both with people getting some training in. They passed a level that featured what was no doubt a combination of laboratory, engineering workshop, and testing grounds; as well as a level that was a vehicle hangar/parking garage. After passing a number of additional levels, they came to a stop at what appeared to be the administrative wing of the facility, and got off the elevator.

"Just head straight to the double-doors at the end of the hall, knock, and you'll be admitted," Kodama instructed. When he looked apprehensive, she gave him a small, reassuring smile. "Don't worry, I'll be with you shortly--just need to get changed into my work clothes." With that, she headed off to the right, which a sign indicated was the direction of the locker rooms. Shinji, nervous, looked around at his new surroundings, before steeling himself enough to walk towards the double-doors Kodama pointed out. Once he arrived, he knocked, taking a brief moment to notice the electronic eye above the center of the doorway.

"Come in," an older, female voice sounded from the other side.

Shinji swallowed a bit, before he took the handle of the right door, pressed the tumbler down, and opened it. He then entered what turned out to be a large office, which in stark contrast to his father's back at NERV HQ, was significantly well-lit and decorated. Just what it was decorated with was furniture and a few lamps that were of a decidedly...retro aesthetic. And by retro, Shinji guessed internally, it all looked as if they came out of the 1960s. His attention then was drawn to two people standing in front of the desk in the center of the office; they were an elderly Western couple, with the man partly supported by a cane and the woman with her hands folded in front of her. Both appeared as if they kept themselves in pretty good shape for being somewhere in their late-80s to early-90s, from the looks of them.

"Shinji Ikari, I presume?" the man greeted in slightly-accented Japanese as he held his hand out, which Shinji hesitantly took and shook. "We've been expecting you. My name is Smart--Maxwell Smart." He then motioned to the woman next to him. "My wife, Barbara Ann."

"How do you do?" Barbara Ann greeted as she shook Shinji's hand as well. "If you're wondering where you are, you're in the current headquarters of a United States-based counterintelligence agency, which Max and I are the co-directors of."

"Just don't call me 'Chief'," Max said. "Only one man deserves that title, and he was the best boss Barbara Ann and I ever had the pleasure of working under."

Shinji found himself dumbfounded by what he'd just heard. "W-wait--are you saying...you're a spy agency?! Like in the movies?"

"Not quite like in the movies," Kodama's voice sounded from behind him. "Let's just say those do a great job of drawing people's attention away from the real work we do here."

Shinji turned around, and what he saw made his jaw drop.

Kodama was standing in front of the door she'd just closed, but she looked nothing like the college student he'd just eaten breakfast with almost an hour ago. Her glasses were gone, her hair was free-flowing, and she was wearing a pastel-orange turtleneck (a simple necklace hanging around her collar), black slacks, and stylish-looking black flats. Indeed, Kodama Horaki looked more 'bombshell' than 'bookish' right now.

"Thank you for bringing him here, 99," Barbara Ann said to Kodama. "We all have a lot to discuss with him."

Shinji looked at the Smarts, and then confusedly back at Kodama. "99?" he said quizzically.

Kodama merely offered him a smile, before she said the following: "Shinji Ikari, welcome to CONTROL."

To be continued...

Featuring:
Shinji Ikari - Sean Giambrone
Kodama Horaki - Rachael MacFarlane
Maxwell Smart - Maurice LaMarche
Barbara Ann Smart - Barbara Feldon
​

**Author's Note(s)**
While like my prior long-form stories, there will be a 'hypothetical English dub cast' list at the very end of it, I decided that, much like regular episodic TV, I'd present characters and their 'voices' at the end of a chapter when they're introduced, just to shake things up a little.

 

[Author0fntent]

Chapter 2 - The Everything-You-Knew-Was-Wrong Affair, Part 1​

A pregnant pause hung in the air after Kodama had 'welcomed' Shinji, and hung there for a few minutes until Shinji finally got his inquisitive gears turning.

"...CONTROL?" he asked. "W-what's CONTROL? And what's the name stand for?" He then looked our way for the briefest of moments and asked an additional question all of us have been asking since Evangelion first premiered back in 1995: "Come to think of it, what does NERV stand for?"

"On that front, I'm afraid I can't answer you there," Kodama replied to that query aimed our way.

"As for CONTROL..." Max began to say, before a hint of embarrassment graced his features, "...well, sorry to say, that one's a bit of a mystery--has been since the founding of the agency. According to a memo from that time, it was decided that all CONTROL employees and operatives from the top down, in the interests of security, could never know the full meaning of the agency's acronym. The folks back then even went to the trouble of destroying every record pertaining to the unabbreviated name."

Kodama appeared to grow baffled by that admission. "Wait, really? Talk about commitment to the bit..."

"What CONTROL is, as an agency, is another story altogether," Barbara Ann said as she pressed a button on the desk that lowered a projection screen as she and Max then moved to the side of Shinji and Kodama. "99, if you could hit the lights, please?" Kodama then pressed the bottom of the light switch just as a projector poked out of a small potted plant on a nearby shelf and turned on, its beam aimed at the screen. Max held up a popcorn bowl between himself and Shinji and offered the boy some, which Shinji, out of habit, took as he tossed a few pieces into his mouth. Barbara Ann then started up the slideshow using the small remote now in her hand. "CONTROL was originally founded in the early years of the Cold War, based primarily out of Washington D.C. though with branches in other parts of the country (and some in a few of the NATO-aligned nations)," she recounted in-between slides. "Its purpose: defending the world against threats to free will everywhere, especially those coming from the international organization of evil known as KAOS."

"If you're wondering what KAOS stands for, that's also one mystery that's remained unsolved to this day," Max chimed in.

"As you've no doubt learned in one history class or another," Barbara Ann continued as she shifted to a slide of an iconic shot of the fall of the Berlin Wall, "the Cold War eventually came to an end, symbolically first with the fall of the Berlin Wall, and then with the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991."

"Partially thanks to, among other things, the old 'outspend the enemy on defense' trick," Max added. "Around the time of the collapse of the Soviets, we at CONTROL managed to take down the last remaining vestiges of KAOS, once and for all."

"But just because one great threat to global freedom was down, didn't mean we couldn't sit idle," Barbara Ann stated. "As the old saying goes, the price of freedom is eternal vigilance."

"So, with KAOS gone, who'd you wind up spying on then?" Shinji asked as he took another palm-ful of popcorn. "The Guatemalans?"

"Mostly various global crime syndicates," Max answered. "For one brief period in 1995, there was an attempt to revive KAOS which, thanks to our timely intervention, we made sure was extremely short-lived."

"How short?" Shinji asked.

"According to our archives," Kodama replied amusedly, "just a single week."

"Other than that, there was the big comeback of the notorious Dr. Evil in '97," Barbara Ann supplied, "which, thankfully, our colleagues 'across the pond' managed to get a handle on."

"With all our work putting out various fires around the world," Max sadly began as he made a gesture of a small space between his thumb and forefinger, "there was just one instance where we really missed it by that much."

"What was it?" Shinji asked, Max's tone making him a bit uneasy.

Barbara Ann switched to the next slide, which depicted a great explosion that was very familiar were one to read a textbook covering recent world history. The photo's date? September 13, 2000. "Second Impact," Barbara Ann grimly answered. It was then that Shinji lost his appetite for further helpings of popcorn, just when he was reaching for another few pieces.

"Of all those who were really unprepared for something of this magnitude, the intelligence community was caught with its pants down the most," Max said. "In the days that followed, most of our time was spent making sure all those fighting in the Impact Wars didn't go any further in their use of weapons of mass destruction, though few did slip through our fingers. (Sorry about the original Tokyo, on that note.)"

"Um, no problem," Shinji said. "Then again, I wasn't, you know, born before then."

"And as you no doubt already know," Barbara Ann continued, "the fighting ceased following the signing of the Valentine Treaty in 2001, which among other things increased the powers of the United Nations to a greater level of effectiveness not seen in the history of the organization before or since. But for a lot of us in the spy business, the timing, the circumstances--it didn't entirely add up."

"We, and others in our profession, felt there was more to all this than anybody realized," Max elaborated. "Before I go any further, answer me this, Shinji--what do you know as the cause of Second Impact?"

Shinji, a bit startled by the sudden question, rubbed the back of his head absentmindedly as he replied. "It-it was caused by a meteorite striking Antarctica--it's what we're all taught in school."

Max, Barbara Ann, and Kodama looked to one another briefly before returning their focus to Shinji. "Sorry to say, Shinji, but I'm afraid that the 'official' explanation isn't the case," Kodama stated.

Shinji's eyes widened on hearing her. "W-What?!"

"Think about it, if you will," Max began to say, "would you believe that a small meteorite, at four inches wide, impacted any part of the planet while traveling at 95% of the speed of light, enough to melt the whole of the Antarctic ice, and as a result cause enormous tsunamis that raised sea levels enough to wipe out a great number of coastal cities and islands? Would you believe that Ceimoa Nan, an astronomer whose credentials are highly dubious at best and practically nonexistent at worst, who was later found to be able to barely tell a planetoid from a pomegranate, just happened to detect it fifteen minutes before impact?"

Shinji, before he could offer a response, took a moment to recall some of the mutterings he overheard from his more nerdy classmates at his old school, mostly debates over the validity of the scientific facts offered by the 'meteorite explanation'. "Well, when you put it that way, it seems like it doesn't make that much sense."

"That's because it doesn't," Barbara Ann said. "We had our own scientific division secretly verify the findings offered by the U.N. investigative committee, and the results all pointed to the same conclusion."

"The whole thing absolutely reeked of a cover-up," Max stated. "A prime example of the old 'acts of God excuse' trick famously used by most major insurance companies if I ever did see it. Perhaps the greatest government cover-up since the true contents of Al Capone's vault--which, if you must know, had actually contained incriminating photos of several high-profile members of a number of Republican administrations up to Hoover. (The Reagan administration had them secretly moved before Geraldo Rivera opened the vault, but I digress...)"

"There were a number of questions we found ourselves asking once we started realizing it was a cover-up," Barbara Ann said. "Chiefly, who, how, and why? We started looking into the matter almost immediately, in conjunction with a number of colleagues and allied agencies. And if it was a cover-up, we took all necessary precautions to ensure we didn't have any moles within our respective agencies that might prevent us from exposing it."

"Eventually," Max began as Barbara Ann handed him the remote, "we found our biggest lead after getting our hands on this--" a press of the button changed the slide to a photo of the Smarts, dressed casually in a crowd of fans somewhere in the Nevada deserts. The sight of the Smarts painted up amid the revelers made Shinji and Kodama cringe slightly. "Whoops, pardon me--that was us at Burning Man in 2005, it was on our bucket list for a good while. (No idea how that photo got in here...)" He then clicked the button again, and this time got the image he wanted, which was of an old binder filled to the brim with notes, documents, and photographs. "The Tallman Dossier, put together by a retired CIA agent over the course of February to September 2000, in the name of finishing what a Japanese colleague of his by the name of Takahiro Kaji had started well before him. But this wasn't the only lead we had--a short while later, we came into possession of the findings put to paper by another who was highly suspicious of the cover-up, and had done his own investigations into it. That person being--" When Max clicked the remote, again the 'audience' was treated to another photo that clearly didn't belong in the set, if the facial reactions on Barbara Ann's, Kodama's, and Shinji's faces were any indicator. "Ah, sorry about this, that's from the New Year's bash of '99, after we'd managed to successfully destroy the Y2K Bug. (Who knew HYMIE could get that much of a buzz from a single beer...?)" Max clicked the remote again, and this time got the photo he wanted; who exactly was in that photo got a very surprised reaction from Shinji.

"Th-that's Sub-Commander Fuyutsuki!" he pointed out.

"Indeed," Barbara Ann affirmed.

"Well before he held that rank and position," Kodama elaborated as Max handed her the remote, "Kozo Fuyutsuki was a well-regarded university professor specializing in the, at the time, newly-emerged field of metaphysical biology. In his teaching days, there were two standout students in his class--" She clicked the remote, switching to a photo of two people who Shinji knew very well, based on the further surprise that grew on his face. "Yui Ikari and Gendo Rokubungi--your parents, Shinji."

Shinji's jaw went slack for a brief moment, before a bit of confusion came upon him. "Rokubungi? I thought--"

"Rokubungi is your father's family name," Kodama clarified. "When he married your mother, bucking a long-held marriage tradition, he took her name instead of the other way around." She then continued the flow of the explanation. "Once we managed to get through both Fuyutsuki's findings in conjunction with the Tallman Dossier, we were able to put a name and a 'face' to the ones behind the true cause of Second Impact." With a click of the remote, the quartet soon found themselves facing the image of a strange, seven-eyed mask, the sight of which unnerved Shinji.

"Who--?" Shinji started to ask.

"They call themselves 'SEELE', from the German word for soul," Kodama answered. "They're a secret cabal with a global reach so extensive and influential, they make the Illuminati look like a simple book club meeting. From what we've been able to gather, this group has been around for decades, as far as the early 20th century, though they themselves have spread rumors that they're supposedly some millennia-old secret society; our guess is in order to keep would-be conspiracy theorists and investigators constantly grasping at straws. Our intel's managed to get us a few key details about the group--among other things, they're led by a 12-man council, with five out of the dozen acting as their public face, the so-called "U.N. Human Instrumentality Committee". Their leader is this man--" She clicked the remote, shifting to the next image, which depicted an elderly man in a high-tech wheelchair and sporting an even more hi-tech visor over his eyes. "--Lorenz Kihl, German business magnate with his fingers in a lot of pies worldwide. He's the one who, from the shadows, spearheaded the efforts that led up to the current world order."

To be continued...​