Thousand Shinji (NGE crossover)

[Darth Fanboy]

There really should be some kind of contest, although I must say that I think your stories actually complement each other in certain ways that make it more interesting. Academia Nut has the best recasting of Shinji as a character with a spine as I've ever seen and even though i'm not a big 40K fan at all I love where the story is heading, while Chris's take not only helps Shinji grow some balls but it actually fits in as a freaking awesome continuation of the series in a way I've never seen a fic do before.

[KlavoHunter]

The moment Asuka went berserker there, it was a foregone conclusion that Israfel was in for a world-ending amount of hurt...



I wonder how you're going to do the battle with Sandalphon? Hopefully you'll write out the high-larious connection between "Thermal expansion = Asuka's tits in a bathing suit = use coolant on Angel".

Frowning, Asuka asks angrily, “You’re not going to jerk off over my comatose body now are you?”

“Please, that would be pathetic. And if you were that deeply asleep I chose to only do something like that, well that reflects poorly on my part, now doesn’t it?” Shinji notes.

[Academia Nut]

Oh, don't worry, what's coming next will only bear a passing resemblance to the original Magma Diver Episode. Most notably, Shinji is going to take one look at the situation and go, "I the immortal words of Admiral Ackbar, 'It's a trap!'"

[Redleader34]

Due to finals I have not seen much of sdn recently. I just read the last few chapters, and they are awsome work. We have Shinji and Asuka's interactions a big plus, Shinji starting to slowly break Asuka, and a HTB ... Wave ... er um, BFG! Now this is a nice Christos present.

Also, you warched Nanoha S1? The White Devil story sounds like a nice thought experment.

[Sidewinder]

Oh, don't worry, what's coming next will only bear a passing resemblance to the original Magma Diver Episode. Most notably, Shinji is going to take one look at the situation and go, "I the immortal words of Admiral Ackbar, 'It's a trap!'"

It's a very sad state when two otaku-turned-fan fic writers come up with better tactics than the writers for the anime they're writing fan fics for.

[Academia Nut]

I divide Eva tactics into three categories: reasonable (unfortunately small), retarded but with the intent of furthering some other agenda (far too common) and just plain retarded (see Magmadiver).

And yeah, I've seen all three seasons of Nanoha, and was somewhat disappointed by the third season, it simply wasn't tight enough and had way too much character bloat and too many cop outs. Damn it, they had the chance to Enterprise the Asura and they chickened out!

Still, Nanoha on her own versus an Angel and/or the JSSDF would be amusing, especially if she was protecting someone important to her. That or letting Gendo experience a shoot through the walls moment. Best part of StrikerS

Oh, and for thought and consideration, here's a rough evolutionary tree of the Angels I cooked up:



EDIT: Rearranged some things.

[Chris OFarrell]

I would personally swap Shamshel and Zeruel around in that list, just because Zeruel has better close combat performance then Shamshel -who really just threw Unit One around then got its 'arms' stuck inside and did nothing- plus one of the, if not the, most powerful energy weapon attacks of the Angels.

*Yes, if its not clear, I think he is the coolest damn Angel of them all, just edging out the D8 of DOOM

[Academia Nut]

I was doing it in a psuedo-evolutionary tree style, so it shows the developmental relationships, and Zeruel is a much more refined version of Shamshel, which is why he's lower down on the list. Basically I broke them up like this:

At Shamshel is the major break point. Sachiel had ranged attacks, a lot of the melee ones did, but was primarily a melee fighter. When Shamshel showed up, you could consider its energy whips to be an advancement of Sachiel's energy rams.

Then we hit Ramiel, the d8 of Doom and the predecessor to two major lines. Ramiel basically moved away from close combat completely and used inaccessability and overwhelming ranged firepower, thus spawning the ranged and hostile environment lines. Ranged is obviously to keep the Evas away and hostile environment is to force the Evas into unfavourable fighting conditions.

Then there was the completely unrelated infiltrator branch. Those Angels were nothing like any from the other branches in that they eschewed direct combat (at least initially) in order to attack NERV from the inside.

EDIT: Decided to move Matariel and Israfel around a little.

[Dominus]

Wow, a fellow gets preoccupied with finals for a week or so and look at what happens. It took me a while to catch up to your prodigious pace, Academia, but I really must applaud you -- this is one of the best AU Evangelion fanfics I've ever read, excepting Chris', of course. And yes, you do have my thanks for saving those battleships. I'm not sure what good they will do humanity when it comes time for Third Impact, but there you have it.

As regards the ongoing discussion of Angelic classifications...

In further consideration, I should probably make the link between Ramiel and Sahaquiel direct and move Matariel off onto a side branch (that one only vaguely fits into my classification system and if it was the cause of the power out rather than some other factor then it might fit into the Infiltrator branch) and then move Israfel off as a side branch of Sachiel.

I was always under the impression that some other party was responsible for the blackout in Tokyo-3 (the Japanese government, perhaps?), and that Matariel's capitalization on it was mere coincidence. Ritsuko did speculate that anyone who was interested would have been able to get a much better grasp of the Geo-Front's layout by monitoring the power restoration process and paying particular attention to the order in which certain critical systems were brought back online.

[Academia Nut]

Yeah, that episode was kind of annoying in the larger arc because they never actually followed up on it. You would think that someone turning off the power like that would have been a big deal afterwards, but not a peep was heard afterwards. Thus there are three good candidates:

1) Kaji
2) A SEELE operative
3) The Angel. If it was using its AT-field at extreme range to shut down the power, then that might explain why it was so easily taken down in combat, in that it was occupied elsewhere keeping the power off and thus vulnerable to attack. If it was the Angel's doing then the tactic was actually rather successful in that it got a nearly unimpeded shot at completing its goals and if the Children had been slower off the bat it might have worked.

Each of these three suspects give a different interpretation to what happened, the third one offering the most radical interpretation. And there really wasn't much confirmation one way or another as to what the hell actually happened in that episode. This problem is of course endemic to the whole damn series.

[Dominus]

Yes, don't I know it. It's impossible to make sense of some of these 'non-sequitur' episodes because they were never elaborated upon and were in many respects simply ignored as far as the storyline is concerned.

Personally, I tend to lean towards the subterfuge angle (there were quite a few parties interested in observing NERV, as we know from the episode that reveals how many different factions Kaji was catering to), but, as you say, there's no evidence for it either way, aside from the fact that Kaji probably wouldn't have wanted to be stuck in an elevator if the sabotage was indeed his doing. I'd just put Matariel off to the side of that chart for now, if I were you. Perhaps it could represent a failed evolutionary line or some-such.

EDIT: Oh, you already did. Nevermind, then.

[Xon]

That or letting Gendo experience a shoot through the walls moment. Best part of StrikerS

The only problem is GeoFront isnt made out of unobtainium strong walls, just concete and metals.

[Academia Nut]

They have stun settings, as evidenced by the next scene which is best described of as "Tackimachi style love and discipline means hitting your daughter in the face with multiple Starlight Breakers".

Besides, you can just increase the distance. Have Gendo in Terminal Dogma and Nanoha flying above Tokyo-3. She's really only limited by the curvature of a planet in range anyway, presuming she doesn't shoot through the planet to hit her target.

Oh, and here's a bit of out of context theatre for the next installment, which is actually from a comedy scene:

Fortunately at that point Kaji interrupted by shouting out, “Toji’s lost a lot of blood! He’s going into shock! Quick, call an ambulance!”

[Xon]

They have stun settings, as evidenced by the next scene which is best described of as "Tackimachi style love and discipline means hitting your daughter in the face with multiple Starlight Breakers".

Nanoha's adopted daughter also had a damn near invulnerable magic defense which was the keystone of the royal family for an entire planet wide empire. And Nanoha overpowered it with brute force, after fighting her way to her and expending considerable effort.

Besides, you can just increase the distance. Have Gendo in Terminal Dogma and Nanoha flying above Tokyo-3. She's really only limited by the curvature of a planet in range anyway, presuming she doesn't shoot through the planet to hit her target.

Yes, nothing in the Nanoha series has required planetary bombardment but I suspect Nanoha would be up to the task.

And it would be great if you (or anyone else) started writing a fic with Nanoha in it, since finding good fanfics for that series is stupidly hard.

[Academia Nut]

There will be no Nanoha fics from me until this one is done. I would actually like to finish a story one of these days...

And, without further ado, here is what I think is probably one of the funnier sequences I've ever written.

---

There were times where, for all his scheming, Shinji found himself caught between forces beyond his control, and could only bow his head and wait for an opportunity for escape lest he be crushed. This was one of those times, and all he could do was pray to Tzeentch for strength and an early escape.

“Okay, we’ve got several million yen and three strong backs to carry our purchases. Let’s get shopping!” Asuka announces.

Toji gave Shinji a look that screamed, “I hate you so much right now.”

Kaji, the most experienced male in the group, had already assumed the look of utter passivity that indicated that he had switched off higher brain functions and was resigned to his fate. He had probably been dragged shopping by Misato before.

Hikari had an ambivalent expression on her face, for on the one hand she was wondering about whether it was proper to spend so much of her friend’s money, but on the other hand the offer of a shopping trip with essentially unlimited funds appealed to her to no end.

Rei had assumed a neutral position, for she was relatively neutral on the whole affair. While she had got a kick out of the Commander’s reaction when Asuka had stormed into his office and demanded an equalization of pay for all pilots, and the tortured look on Shinji’s face was worth the price of admission, Asuka had more or less dragged her into the shower before coming shopping, something that had soured her mood somewhat. Especially the enforced use of soap.

Of course, when she had told that last fact to everyone, Shinji and Toji had both excused themselves to the bathroom for a few minutes before returning with small bits of bloody toilet paper stuffed up their nostrils. Rei did not quite understand what that had been about, but the other two females in their group had just rolled their eyes while Kaji just snickered a little.

“Okay, first order of business is to get Rei a new wardrobe,” Asuka announces before leading the merry band of over-financed teenagers and one secret agent chaperone into Tokyo-3’s busiest shopping district while making a beeline for the most expensive boutiques.

Their first stop ended with the saleswoman in tears, meaning that for Shinji the day was already looking up. The arrogant bitch had simply assumed that because they were all teenagers they couldn’t afford to shop at the store. She and Asuka rapidly got in a shouting match, which ended with Shinji pulling out his wallet and flashing all the cash as he got out a map of the shopping district so as to recommend a competitor’s store.

The fact that he did this right in front of the manager was the most priceless bit. When the manager tried to talk them into staying, Shinji had just smiled and said, “I can understand if you feel we do not look wealthy enough to shop here, but at least be polite when you try to ask us to leave so that we might explain the situation. The rudeness of your employee however has led me to ask that you politely kiss my ass as we walk out here.”

Shinji got a round of applause once they were out of that store, to which he took a dramatic bow. Somebody was going to need a new job.

Several stores later and they still had not found anything that Rei wanted, although both Asuka and Hikari had done some shopping along the way. Their purchases were very telling of their character really. Asuka was very fond of loose, airy clothing that accentuated her curves while also giving her a great deal of freedom of motion. They were, simply put, the best compromise between being “girly” and “ass-kicking” that Asuka could probably find.

Hikari on the other hand, she was much more about order. Outwardly the clothing she got was very simple and plain looking, if with a keen eye towards exquisiteness of cut, but inside there were often all sorts of arcane devices whose purpose could only be divined by the female mind and presumably the designers. They lifted, supported, constrained, and quite possibly made coffee, but the effect was quite evident as Toji had to leave several times to go to the bathroom to replenish his supply of toilet paper. Eventually Shinji looked at his friend and said, “I think we need to stop for lunch, Toji is starting to look a little hungry.”

This was of course a lie as Toji was starting to look rather anaemic from acute blood loss and he probably needed a large dosage of fluids, proteins, and iron to help offset the loss. An American style hamburger with a drink and fries would probably do the trick. The girls still wanted to do a little shopping first, so they agreed to split off for the moment. Besides, they were talking about stopping off at the lingerie stores, and Toji probably wouldn’t survive something like that.

Sitting down at the cafeteria, Toji just looked at Shinji and said, “Man, I don’t know whether to punch you or kiss you.”

“I would prefer the punch, I can block that less awkwardly,” Shinji says while snacking on a strange concoction from a North American place. It was best described as “heart disease on a plate” but it was apparently called “poutine”. It tasted alright, and it was something different.

After munching on his burger for a while Toji asks, “So what do you think was meant by Soryu ‘forcing’ Ayanami to bathe?”

Chuckling, Shinji says, “Oh, she probably just stood outside the shower and ordered Rei to shower and use soap.”

“Yeah, but if Rei didn’t want to do something like that, how could she be made to?” Toji asks.

“Oh, a stern glare and waiting impatiently for Rei to come out damp and smelling like soap instead of body odour was probably all that was required,” Shinji says.

“Oh come on, you don’t really believe that’s all that happened. I bet it was all like… a highly civilized affair,” Toji says, catching one of Shinji’s cues for ‘the person you’re talking about is standing right behind you so shut up’.

“Hey Rei, how goes it?” Shinji asks.

“I did not need any new undergarments, so I decided to meet you early,” Rei replies softly while sitting down at the table with a bowl of natto.

Shinji was somehow not surprised Rei had acquired a taste for fermented soy beans. He suspected she was also eating a lot more cheese as well. Shinji had a sudden horrific moment as he wondered what a sudden taste for fermented foods would do to Rei’s digestive tract.

“Why did you just shudder, Shinji?” Rei asks while beginning to eat her fermented soy beans.

“Oh, no reason,” Shinji says.

A long string of congealed soy paste hanging from her chopsticks, Rei says, “I can assure you that as a young lady I do not have any problems with flatulence.”

Toji toppled over in shock at that statement.

I broadcast that thought, didn’t I?

Yes.

You’re getting better at this sort of thing.

You are a skilled teacher.

And you, incidentally, are still a poor liar.

I am certain that if I were to have any roommates, they would be grateful for the fact that I live alone.

Smirking at that little joke, Shinji helps Toji get back into his seat just in time for Asuka and Hikari to show up, Kaji trailing them with the distinctly blank look of a man hauled through a women’s lingerie store. It was the kind of look that said, “I’m just here to hold the bags and I can assure you I am not looking at anything.”

Asuka took one look at what Shinji was eating and then said in exasperation, “You can get poutine and I can’t find a decent German restaurant anywhere? What the hell?”

Shrugging, Shinji says, “It’s capitalism. The Americans like to spread their influence and all that.”

“Poutine is actually a Quebecois Canadian dish,” Kaji points out.

Looking at the food quizzically, Shinji asks, “Okay, how the hell did this stuff get into Japan anyway?”

“Probably a market from the Canadians brought over to teach English,” Hikari suggests.

“If that were the case, wouldn’t there be more donut shops?” Kaji counters.

“Canada jealously guards the secrets to its donuts. It’s a well known fact,” Shinji points out with an utterly serious tone.

“If the Japanese eat that natto stuff, I can see why someone could see poutine catching on here,” Asuka puts in sarcastically.

“That seems unlikely as there are no sauerkraut places. I have looked,” Rei says, not taking the jab at her taste in food lying down.

The rest of the lunch was a bickering match about tastes in food, although they eventually let the conversation peter out as they finished their meals. Then it was back to shopping.

After a few more hours of fruitlessly trying to find something Rei enjoyed, although Asuka and Hikari’s wardrobes certainly expanded considerably. Much to the horror of the males, it looked like the girls were going to have to make a repeat trip to actually accomplish their mission of getting Rei some new clothes.

And then Rei paused in their journeys to look through the window of a second hand clothing store.

“Oh, you don’t want to shop there,” Asuka says.

“No… wait…” Shinji says, raising his hand to stall things while going up to Rei.

He sees her eyeing the ratty looking clothes and whispers to her, “It's a bridesmaid's dress. Someone loved it intensely for one day. Then, tossed it... like a Christmas tree. So special, then bam; it's on the side of the road, tinsel still clinging to it, like a sex crime victim, underwear inside out, bound with electrical tape.”

“It’s not a bridesmaid’s dress,” Rei corrects quietly.

“It’s a quote, to sum up your feelings. You are attracted to the abandoned, to the despairing, to that which is decaying from the beauty it once had. It is not the price that attracts you; it is the essence of the item. You would buy antiques simply to revel in their obsolescence, to watch them crumble with time. Nurgle teaches that there can still be joy in despair, so find your joy where you may,” Shinji tells her.

Absorbing this, Rei immediately walks into the store, leaving Asuka to glare furiously at Shinji.

Shinji was quite amused by the fact that she didn’t even notice the fact that she wasn’t paying attention to her precious Kaji. Kaji was also quite amused by it as well, and relieved.

“What was that about?” Asuka demanded.

“I was just telling Rei what she needed to hear,” Shinji replies.

“And we couldn’t hear it?” Asuka asks.

“Would you like it if I paraded your dirty laundry about for everyone to hear?” Shinji asks.

That made Asuka shut up right quick.

Following Rei into the shop, what happened next was a descent into a surreal world of Rei getting excited and happy as she almost maniacally went through dozens of second or even third hand outfits before assembling a wardrobe that could best be described of as “fabulously ghetto". It was an embracement of urban decay and poverty by a very wealthy individual.

Rei left the shop wearing a light, frilly Western style bridesmaid’s dress, a battered looking long jacket that had probably been donated to charity by a dead hobo, a paint-stained grey toque, threadbare red gloves with the fingers cut off, and combat boots two sizes too big for Rei that had probably first seen use shortly after Second Impact. The rest of her purchases were similarly eclectic, and Rei had actually asked to see some of the items that they store had been considering tossing as being too badly damaged to sell.

Everyone but Shinji just looked at Rei in exasperation at her bizarre choices.

“Aren’t you hot wearing all that?” Asuka finally asks.

“Yes. Very. Thank you,” Rei replies.

It took several moments to parse that statement, at which point Shinji and Kaji started chuckling and Asuka just shrieked in frustration and clarified, “I mean warm, your temperature excessively high, the flow of thermal energy not being in your favour in this climate.”

“Yes,” Rei says with a smile.

“Gah! You’ll have a heat stroke!” Asuka says.

Considering this for a moment, Rei answers, “Then I shall use all that money I saved to buy water so as to avoid that.”

“You’ll sweat like crazy!” Asuka points out in frustration.

“That is acceptable,” Rei replies, obviously relishing the prospect.

“And after I held you down and soaped you up this morning too!” Asuka cried out before realizing that perhaps that was too much information.

Shinji managed to clamp down on his nose in time but Toji suffered an explosive nosebleed and promptly collapsed.

“Toji!” Hikari cries out while rushing to her fallen boyfriend, Kaji moving to administer first aid to the overwhelmed teenager.

Blushing bright red, Asuka says, “It’s not like it sounds! It was at one of the school showers and we were wearing our bathing suits!”

Cocking her head to the side, Rei says, “You were wearing your bathing suit, I was quite naked when you pinned me beneath the shower and began scrubbing.”

“They didn’t need to know that!” Asuka shrieked while turning a brilliant vermillion colour.

“You were quite insistent in fact. I am in fact wondering if… what is the phrase? Ah yes. If ‘I am still suitable for marriage’,” Rei replies.

Asuka was at this point somewhere between burgundy and maroon, and she screamed out, “IT DID NOT HAPPEN AT ALL LIKE THAT!”

“Do you deny saying, ‘Every inch of your body is getting a good hard soaping!’ after I protested your insistence that I bathe before we went shopping?” Rei asked.

“Uh…” Asuka replied, trying to come up with an appropriate response.

Fortunately at that point Kaji interrupted by shouting out, “Toji’s lost a lot of blood! He’s going into shock! Quick, call an ambulance!”


“You know, if you flashed the class, I bet you could kill half the male population,” Shinji says hours later back at home while working the blood out of his Tyrian purple shirt.

“Toji’s an idiot and Rei’s a liar,” Asuka grumbles.

“Toji’s been hospitalized and you never denied that quote from Rei,” Shinji replies.

“Alright, she’s a horrible exaggerator! Happy now?” Asuka shrieks.

“No! This shirt was brand new,” Shinji complains while holding up the stained garment.

“Gah! Why must you take her side?” Asuka screams.

Smiling, Shinji says, “I’m not. I just enjoy winding you up, or have you not figured that out by now?”

Growling in frustration, Asuka says, “Why? Why must you be like that?”

Returning to his work, Shinji says, “Because your responses amuse me. You have a fire and passion that I don’t, and it excites me to see that. When the world hits you, I want to see you hit back. It’s beautiful.”

“Yeah, right,” Asuka says while rolling her eyes.

“No really. I was in awe of you when you were fighting with Israfel the other day. Your movements were so fluid, so sure, that I did not feel like I was looking at Unit 02, but you. It was incredible,” Shinji explains.

“Should I feel ‘complimented’?” Asuka asks.

“Hell yes! You’re that good. When you spun your Eva about to deliver that axe blow to the half behind you, it was like I was seeing you there, hair flashing behind you and skirt twirling about your legs dramatically. I was a little turned on by it,” Shinji says, pausing in his work to savour the memory.

“Pervert,” Asuka mutters sarcastically. There was however a small smile on her face.

Shrugging, Shinji says, “Hey, what can I say? I like my women confident, wielding a huge axe, and blood drenched. Ensures they’ll be wild in bed.”

Nodding his head to the side to avoid the pillow thrown his way, Shinji smiles and says, “I kid, I kid, for I am but a kid, juvenile in my humour.”

“Please, you’re less juvenile than Misato-san and she’s an adult,” Asuka replies.

“That speaks not highly of me but poorly of her,” Shinji replies.

Suddenly putting on a sullen look, Asuka says, “No… no… Misato can be mature when she wants to be, as much as we all hate to admit it. You… you only pretend to be a kid. You’re stronger than me.”

Shaking his head, Shinji says, “Alright, no more of this morose bullshit Asuka. Do you want to know why I’m always so damned strong? Because when I was four, my mother died and my father just fucking abandoned me. The day after the worst day of my life, he just said, ‘Fuck you son, your mother’s dead now so I’m not going to bother acting like a man, I’m just going to send you on your merry way’. After that, I had a choice: break or become stronger than the fuck head that did that to me.”

Recoiling at Shinji’s sudden vitriol and coarse language, Asuka says, “So you got stronger.”

“No, I broke! I was four! The age of four isn’t categorized by robust emotional strength, its categorized by insecurities and crying,” Shinji retaliates bitterly. “You were the one who decided to get strong, not me.”

This shocked Asuka to the core and she suddenly wondered how differently their lives could have been had they responded just a little differently back then.

“Then how…?” Asuka asks.

Smiling, Shinji says, “I found a mentor, or more precisely my mentor found me. I found someone who loved and cared for me, saw that I had potential and refused to accept my bullshit. Yeah, mommy is dead and daddy doesn’t love me, big deal, the world keeps turning despite such earth shattering tragedies. I was broken and he put me back together.”

Asuka was very quiet for a long time before she asked, “Are you…?”

“Passing the favour forward? Yeah. I’ve been helping Rei since I got here, she was far worse than she is now socially, and then you came along. You were the kid, the one in a million, who chose to become strong instead of break in response to such monumental adversity. But I could see it in your eyes, the tone of your voice in sheltered moments that you still carried the wounds, that you were more fragile than you seemed,” Shinji explains.

The house was silent for a long time before Asuka got up out of her chair and walked over to Shinji, sat down full in his lap, and kissed him. As far as second kisses went, it was orders of magnitude better than the first, but then again that wasn’t hard considering that their first kiss sucked worse than a leaky vacuum chamber.

Breaking it off, Asuka looked at Shinji, her face inches from his and tears running down her cheeks and said, “All my life… or at least since momma died, people have been asking things of me, or I of them. No one has ever, EVER, really done anything for me so freely and readily.”

Smiling crookedly, Shinji grins stupidly as his brain re-engages and he replies, “Is it really free and ready if I was doing it so that I could get a hot girl sitting on my lap kissing me?”

Half laughing and half crying, Asuka says, “Shut up stupid and kiss me again. You need practice.”

“You need practice,” Shinji replied.

For the third go they got so into the moment that they did not even notice as they began to tip over the chair, and only realized what was happening when it was already too late. With a crash and the sound of wood splintering, they fell to the floor, Shinji smacking his head against the floor while Asuka smacked her head against Shinji’s.

Also, in attempt to prevent from being crushed, Shinji threw up his hands to try and catch Asuka’s shoulders, but his aim was a little off and he instead got a handful of breast each.

As dictated by the laws of cosmic irony, Misato took that exact moment to enter the apartment and find them sprawled out like this.

Looking up with half-concussed eyes, Shinji looked right at Misato and said, “This is exactly what it looks. Asuka and I were making out so hot and heavily that we tipped over and broke the chair.”

Rolling her eyes, Misato helps Asuka up so that Shinji can politely disengage his hands and says, “Damn it, if you’re going to fight, at least try not to break any furniture next time.”

“Yes Misato-san,” Shinji says while going to the fridge and getting out a beer and tossing it to their tired looking guardian.

Adroitly catching it, opening it, and downing the whole thing in one go Misato catches the next one and merely sets it down on the table, clearly intending to nurse it.

“Long day?” Shinji asks.

“Terrible. The commander was pretty pissed about the cost of the clean-up efforts for Ramiel coming in over budget and decided to take it out on all of us. He also seems to have a bug up his… err… something else has been annoying him lately,” Misato says, slumping down in an unbroken chair while the two Children cleaned up the remains of the one they broke.

“So tonight you get drunk to forget your woes?” Shinji asks in a somewhat worried tone.

“Nah, I have to go to work again tomorrow, so it would be unprofessional to show up with a hang-over. I’ll just get pleasantly buzzed to make the woes fuzzier,” Misato replies while cracking open the second beer can.

After drinking a bit, she says, “Oh, and speaking of woes, I’ve got some bad news for you guys.”

“Oh?” Shinji asks.

“I’m afraid that since you’re on active standby at all times you can’t go on the school trip to Okinawa,” Misato says.

“WHAT?” Asuka cries out in horror and disappointment.

“Sorry, but that’s just the way things have to be. The Angels could attack at any time, and we have to be ready for them,” Misato replies.

“This is so unfair. Tell her Shinji,” Asuka pleads.

Shrugging, Shinji says, “I don’t know, what sounds like more fun to you, scuba diving or ploughing the spinning teeth of a chain axe through the yielding flesh of an Angel, alien blood spraying everywhere in a fountain of gore?”

Laughing, Misato says, “You sure do know how to make a girl feel loved, Shin-chan.”

Her brows furrowed in thought, head turned down slightly, Asuka eventually says, “Actually the second does sound more appealing when you put it that way. I suppose even if no Angels attack it would be a chance to get away from the monkey antics of Kensuke and Toji for a while.”

Laughing at that even harder, Misato says, “Good to see you’re seeing the positive side of this Asuka. And the time will let you catch up on your homework.” She then holds up a pair of report cards. “Don’t think I wouldn’t get these, your marks are automatically sent to my terminal at work, and you’re both slipping.”

“Physical trauma inflicted while saving the human race tends to distract from proper education,” Shinji says sarcastically, covering for the pain he felt at that little blow. He valued his brains above all else and he had consistently kept his grades up as his one method of openly showing his superiority that wouldn’t eventually devolving into him cackling atop a pile of lightning charred corpses.

Grumbling Asuka just makes some half formed comment about the grading system in Japan before storming off to her room, saying she would “Study”.

Later that night with Misato safely passed out in her room, Asuka snuck into Shinji’s room.

“Here to finish up where we left off? I think I can still find the pieces of the chair,” Shinji whispers.

“Ha-ha, very funny. I… I came here for a couple of reasons, and kissing you was only one,” Asuka admits timidly.

“Oh?” Shinji says.

“Yeah… one, I wanted to ask how you got us out of that… situation earlier. Oh, and I still owe you this,” Asuka says before punching him hard in the arm.

“Ow!” Shinji hisses. “Come on, you knew that was an accident.”

“Yeah, well, I’m probably going to have palm print bruises on my chest and it’s your fault. Anyway, how did you do that earlier?” Asuka asks.

“In situations where denial or dishonesty is expected, the truth can often be dismissed as fabrication. Control of a situation is not just based off what you do, but what others expect you to do,” Shinji says.

“You… lied by telling the truth?” Asuka asks incredulously.

“Think of it like pretending to make a feint in combat. If your opponent expects you to feint, if you follow through then the expected strike was the lie while the feint was a real attack,” Shinji replies.

“Okay, that makes a bit more sense when put into those terms,” Asuka says. She then says, “And I uh… I wanted to ask you for… uh… for some help.”

Raising a quizzical eyebrow, Shinji says, “Oh do go on.”

“Shut it. You see, the thing is… the reason I’m having trouble in school is that I don’t know a lot of the kanji, so I have difficulty understanding the questions. Everything else is really easy,” Asuka explains.

“Sounds reasonable,” Shinji muses. “I presume then that you want me to help you with your written Japanese.”

“If you could. I can help you with your homework, I took most of it already when I was in college,” Asuka says.

Shinji’s eyes went wide and he squeaked, “You went to college?”

“Yeah, I graduated last year,” Asuka says with a smug smile.

Thinking over this information for a moment, Shinji asks, “Do you want to lose your virginity tonight? Because I am so turned on right now. Brains, beauty, and a degree in what I must presume is ass kicking, what more could a guy want?”

Whacking him upside the head, but lightly and playfully, Asuka mutters, “Pervert. But the reason I came now instead of in the morning is because I do want to continue making out with you. The night is lonely and you make me feel so warm.”

“Sounds good to me,” Shinji replies eagerly.

Two minutes in, before they had even moved on to groping, they heard Misato stirring outside, probably getting up to go to the bathroom. Asuka squeaked, “She’ll find us!”

“Relax, I came prepared. There’s a glass of water on my nightstand, just dump it over my head and then run for your room while I splutter and scream indignantly,” Shinji whispers to her.

Glancing at him incredulously, Asuka says, “How do you prepare for something like this?”

“The glass of water is intended for a wide variety of contingencies, the primary one being me getting thirsty, but you sneaking into my room to make out and then having to beat a hasty retreat with some form of plausible deniability was one of a few small possibilities planned for,” Shinji explains.

“You’re weird Shinji… but I think I kind of like that,” Asuka replies.

“Good. Now get to the attempted drowning,” Shinji replies.

A few moments later Asuka ran out of the room with an empty glass in her hand and Shinji screaming, “You bitch!”

Misato just rolled her eyes, smiled at their antics, and went back to bed.

She would have to make sure they had both had ‘The Talk’ in the morning. They were so cute, if stupid, together.

[Xon]

There will be no Nanoha fics from me until this one is done. I would actually like to finish a story one of these days...

Well you havent discounted writing it sometime in the future so I'm happy

And, without further ado, here is what I think is probably one of the funnier sequences I've ever written.

I dont enjoy NGE as a rule because I found out about it roughly as it was finishing. The canon characters are generally despicable or in appalling situations (or both). That as a Westerner where Individuality is a highly important quaility, the concept of everyone desolving into orange Tang is considerably worse than any Christian concept of hell I've ever read about.

I found this fic very much enjoyable, and hope you finish this one too!

[Chris OFarrell]

*sigh*

Well now I'm going to have to utterly rewrite MY fics shopping trip and chunks of the Asuka-Shinji relationship to make sure no-one thinks I'm copying

Well thats okay; I can dig it when I get to read stuff this bloody hilarious
Keep it coming.

[Setzer]

So who's going to end up a devotee of Slaanesh? Toji? Or will one of the other students get picked instead of him?

And you seem to be emphasizing the nearly forgotten Good aspects of Chaos. Asuka has the courage and righteous fury of Khorne, Shinji has been callously manipulating everyone, but is doing it to help his people get over their emotional trauma, and Rei...

I can see Rei taking in a crippled, mangy dog and loving it when anyone else would have thrown rocks at it.

[Dominus]

Ah, I do so enjoy watching Shinji deconstruct Asuka's psyche and build her back up again. As others have said, you really seem to be emphasizing the rarely seen "good" aspects of the Gods of Chaos, which frequently tend to get, ah, overlooked in the Imperial-centric Black Library literature. I daresay that all of these terrifically flawed characters are doing much better than they were in the OTL thanks primarily to Shinji's influence -- it seems that Tzeentch is indeed the deity of hope, after all. A false and insincere hope, perhaps, but hope nevertheless.

[KlavoHunter]

So who's going to end up a devotee of Slaanesh? Toji? Or will one of the other students get picked instead of him?

I thought it was made obvious that it was kinda Misato who was that; if not in a direct, intentional, "Hey I'm a psyker" sort of way.



I wonder when Shinji's four little buddies are going to get some fresh air? I mean, cooped up in those jars all these chapters...!

[Academia Nut]

Oh, trust me, I have plans for everything from now until the end. All plot points are set in my mind and I know how this will all play out. There are still a few wiggle points, but in general its going to be a while until say Shinji whips out his "All is dust" buddies. He needs to have a really good reason to bring them out, because they are kind of obvious.

And the reason the Chaos aspect is blending so well with the NGE characters I think is because they're all so fucked up. Chaos does not appeal to normal people, it appeals to those in bad situations desperate for easy answers for the most part. The "good" aspects can be thought of like a thermodynamic system: at any specific temperature there is a wide range of energies the individual particles can take on, but when you have 10^23 particles they tend to cluster very tightly around the mean. On the other hand, when you have say four particles, then the individual characteristics of each contribute hugely to the whole.

Or, more simply put, you can see the positive because they're not drowning in billions of examples of the negative.

Oh, and Chris? Our shopping trips were that close? Damn... Well, at least we can say that great minds think a like, right?

[Chris OFarrell]

So...just thought of something.
Does this mean the Lance of Longinus is a Daemon Weapon with a Greater Daemon bound within, hungry to devour the souls of Angels and Evas?

[Sidewinder]

I'm surprised at the humor in the latest chapter, e.g., stretching the "get horny, get nosebleeds" old wives' tale to such extremes.

As for Sandalphon, my idea for defeating him is to cover N2 weapons in a heat-resistant protective envelope, and then dropping the bombs into the volcano, one after the other, until the Angel breaks up. Do you think that'll work?

[Academia Nut]

Bonus for you all, you get to see the start of the Sandalphon fight early. I'll have the rest up tomorrow some time.

---

The mortification the two of them experienced after Misato gave them ‘The Talk’ in the morning lasted for days, especially since Misato was so cheerfully nonchalant about the whole thing and seemed completely unashamed about the explicitness of her explanations. They had only been able to stare in mute horror as she showed them where her stash of condoms was located before she proceeded to give a demonstration on how to actually put one on using a banana as reference.

Their protests of “Too much information!” went on deaf ears, and even seemed to egg Misato on. When she started giving tips they had simply run screaming from the apartment, holding their ears.

When they finally stopped running, Shinji could only mutter, “That woman is worse than a Keeper of Secrets I tell you.”

“Keeper of Secrets?” Asuka asks while trying to regain her breath next to him.

“Oh, just a mythological creature from my religion, a servant of one of the gods,” Shinji explains. “A Keeper of Secrets knows what you want, and can tell you how to get it… for a price.”

“That sounds… almost like a demon,” Asuka says.

Snickering, “Oh, but the lines betweens daemons and angels are ever so thin. We fight and kill the Angels, so would that not make us the daemons? Besides, things always have a price in life. Every god demands worship, and why should the costs not be explicitly spelled out? There is faith and then there is foolishness.”

Asuka shuddered at Shinji’s cold, callousness, and she asked, “What did we just pay for back there then?”

“Well, we clearly lost a small portion of our sanity back there. What we gained, I suppose, was a measure of knowledge and safety. Misato… she truly loves and cares for us; she just has a great deal of trouble expressing it appropriately. She is the sort of person that when she sees a challenge she throws herself head-first at it and damn the consequences,” Shinji explains.

Sniffing, Asuka says, “I really didn’t need to know all that.”

Smirking, Shinji points out, “Says the girl who snuck into my room last night to make out. In a way though, I think she is the one being the most mature about this.”

Blushing at Shinji’s rebuttal, Asuka protests, “I don’t think it was appropriate to show us that… banana thing…”

“Oh? And just telling us, ‘Don’t do anything stupid’ would be more appropriate? Sure, she could give us new, separate living quarters, but we still go to school together, still work together. That would simply make the situation worse as we would have to sneak off if we wanted to see each other privately. She wants us to be happy and to be safe, and even if her presentation involved far too much detail, I am glad that she cares enough to actually take responsibility like that. Unlike some people,” Shinji says, adding on the last part darkly.

“Yeah, but that whole thing with the t…” Asuka begins before being cut off.

“We will not speak of that,” Shinji tells her and she gladly shuts up.

After a few moments of silence, Asuka asks curiously, “So what god would have a… Keeper of Secrets… as a servant?”

“Slaanesh, Prince of Pleasure, although like all the gods in the pantheon, they are many things. A being of intense sensuality, it must be pointed out that there are many forms of pleasure, of sensation. Slaanesh embodies everything from a passionate kiss to the warm feeling of satisfaction an artist gets upon completion of a great work. It is easier for those who do not understand to become lost in the surface aspects of hedonism and dismiss Slaanesh as a corrupt, decadent being. The core of Slaanesh though is to attain perfection. Sex, drugs, rock and roll, these are merely steps on a path,” Shinji explains.

Looking at him oddly, Asuka asks, “I thought you said you worshipped something else?”

“I know of Slaanesh, but I do not worship him. I give my faith and prayers to Tzeentch, a god of change and evolution and hope. I move onwards, breaking down boundaries to find the truth of things, to become something more, something greater. On the surface, Tzeentch is the most callous of the gods, as the old is thrown out in favour of the new, but this is merely a surface observation. Tzeentch does not abandon his followers, they abandon him. He is a god of change and motion, and if you do not keep up with him, keep hope alive, then he will outpace you, as is his nature. Only a fool attempts to surf a wave and then curses the wave when he cannot keep up with it. So long as there is hope, you can keep up with him,” Shinji explains.

Frowning, Asuka says, “You’re right, that does sound callous.”

Laughing, Shinji says, “Then perhaps you would like to hear of Tzeentch’s rival, Papa Nurgle? Nurgle is a god of decay, despair, and joy. Nurgle is the sort of god that would walk into the paediatric ward of a hospice filled with sick, dying children and read to them instead of healing them, simply because their smiles are more precious to him than their health. He is life without restraint, as cancer is life without restraint, burning away to inevitable oblivion… and enjoying every putrescent moment of it. Rei has recently taken up the path of Nurgle, seeing before her a path to oblivion and deciding to enjoy the journey.”

“Ewww…” Asuka says, making a disgusted face.

Shrugging, Shinji says, “She made her choice, who am I to interfere?”

By now though, Asuka was curious, and after a moment of silence, she asks, “I thought there were four gods in your religion? Who’s the fourth one?”

Welcome to my parlour said the spider to the fly.

“The War God, the Blood God, Khorne. Khorne is an angry god, but then again, there is so much in life to be angry about. There is a difference between mindless, nihilistic anger and righteous anger. Khorne and his followers rage against the unfairness of life, seek to bring those they perceive as unworthy low. Blood is central to them, but then again, blood is central to many religions. Blood is life; blood is action; blood is sacrifice. Khorne cares not from where the blood flows, whether it comes from a slain enemy or a martyr holding back a dread tide to protect the innocent. The Catholics drink the blood of Jesus to accept his sacrifice, Khorne is similar, only with less drinking and more spilling,” Shinji explains.

He watched the thoughts resonate in Asuka’s head. They would not take now, but a seed had been planted that over hours and days would grow, and she would yearn to know more.

It was at about that point they realized that they had both forgot their bags back at the apartment and they were already at school.

And there was much raging.


Their friends gone to Okinawa, the three pilots had little to do, so today they were swimming laps in the pool, going back and forth, feeling the cool wetness on sliding across their skin and the exertion of their muscles to plough through the water. Eventually it became something of a competition between the three Children, with Asuka quickly pulling ahead before falling behind due to exhaustion.

Between Shinji and Rei, it was a close match. Shinji was stronger than her, but before he had shown her the wonders of Chaos swimming had been her one pleasure in her otherwise dull life, so she had a considerably better technique. Not only that, but she had a boundless endurance.

Ah, going to cheat are you?

It is not cheating; it is merely using an advantage that you do not have.

Good, because I’m going to cheat now.

Instead of swimming like a normal person, Shinji simply used his telekinesis to push himself through the water and push the water out of the way, zipping back and forth between the walls impossibly fast, within a minute gaining such a formidable lead on Rei that she simply stopped mid lap and said, “You win.”

Asuka, of course, was gaping open mouthed at Shinji the human supercavitating torpedo. Sliding up next to her, he popped his head out of the water and grinned at her.

“How… what… how did you do that?” Asuka demands urgently.

“Can you keep a secret?” Shinji asks, his grin fading away into a deadly serious tone.

“Uh… yeah…” Asuka replies, noticing the way Rei had slid up quietly behind her.

The grin returning, Shinji says, “Why do you think they need children to pilot the Evas? Specifically, why do they need children born after Second Impact?”

“It is because Second Impact changed humanity,” Rei says softly while rising up her palm to show a perfect sphere of water suspended there.

Wide eyed, Asuka did not even get off a proper response before she heard Shinji say in a funny voice, “The Children are indeed special.”

Turning to him, she just saw him smiling at her, and then he said, without moving his lips or throat, “What?”

“You… you…” Asuka stutters.

“Shinji is far better at it than I, I can only broadcast to him,” Rei tells her.

“Come now Asuka, you’ve always known you were special, you just didn’t know how special until now. After everything you’ve seen, do you think that the possession of psychic abilities are really that strange?” Shinji asks.

Sliding about in the water around her, he says, “In fact, do you not think it unusual that Toji suffered such an explosive nosebleed right when you were so embarrassed by Rei? That sort of explosive nose bleeding doesn’t really happen in real life.”

“But… but… what?” Asuka asks, suddenly feeling very small.

“Oh, relax, you did minimal damage in the long run, and you already in fact have a measure of control over your abilities simply because you can pilot an Eva. You simply need to learn more control,” Shinji explains. “This is something I can teach you.”

“He taught me,” Rei says softly.

“Indeed. Tell me, why do you think Rei took up worship of Nurgle?” Shinji asks.

Looking between the two of them, Asuka asks, “Is it because your religion helps with control over your abilities?”

“Bingo. Our abilities are based around control and manipulation of emotion, and the gods are beings that are made of emotion. Their teachings are useful,” Shinji says slyly.

“How?” Asuka asks.

“Tzeentch tells us that there are no coincidences. If you agree to keep this secret then I will teach you about this, fair? If you do not agree, I will brute force my way into your mind and surgically remove this conversation from your memories. I do not appreciate being considered a freak, or people trying to use more than they already do now that I’m a pilot. I do believe you can appreciate those sentiments,” Shinji explains.

Asuka suddenly had a more pressing concern on her mind.

“Hey! Wait a minute! Were you screwing around with my mind when… you…” Her protest was suddenly shut down as Shinji’s eyes glowed with a lambent blue fire and the water of pool precipitously dropped in temperature, even forming little feathers of ice about him.

You would know it if I did anything more powerful than simply read your surface thoughts, even if it was by the sections of memory that were simply gone.

Shinji then let all that power build up slowly bleed back out into the environment, his point quite clearly made. The serious look also bled away, leaving him with a grin. Gently pushing a lock of hair out of Asuka’s face, he smiled at her and said, “I hold many secrets, but my affection for you has always been sincere and my words truthful.”

“Perhaps your jealousy of me would be lessened once we start sharing Shinji-kun,” Rei states.

“Sharing?” Asuka asks in a fit of outrage.

Sighing and shaking his head, Shinji says, “Ever since I converted her to Nurgle, Rei has shown great joy in causing things to break down. Ignore her or she will gain immense satisfaction from your annoyance.”

“Ignore me and it will come back to bite you,” Rei says with a smile.

“Okay, I’ll amend that. Listen to her at your own risk, but ignore her at your risk as well,” Shinji replies.


“Okay… if I may? If I may, I would just like to point out a few things here,” Shinji says at the tactical briefing called upon the discovery of the latest Angel.

“Ahem. A list should suffice. One: we have never found an Angel before it attacked us, much less in an apparently dormant and embryonic state. Two: this Angel is in possibly the most hostile location on the planet, over a thousand feet beneath the surface of an active volcano, surrounded by molten rock where it will be a challenge to know whether the crushing pressure or the intense heat will destroy something first. Three: the Type-L equipment will not work under such conditions, because we would be going into boiling hot magma, a significant point considering that the Type-L was designed to counter the increasing power of the Angels. Four: boiling hot magma is incredibly dense and would thus impede motion massively. Five: the Evas are not physically dense enough to actually sink into boiling hot magma, so to actually get down that deep would require extra dense weights to be added, which would impair movement even more than the sort of heavy armour required to actually survive while surrounded on all sides by boiling hot magma. Six: the last report from the probe said that the Angel was sinking deeper into the boiling hot magma. Seven:[/i] boiling hot magma![/i]

“So, to sum up, in the immortal words of Admiral Ackbar, ‘It’s a trap!’ This is such a trap that I reserve the right as a soldier to refuse an obviously suicidal order,” Shinji finishes off.

Listening to this, Asuka nods and says, “I too reserve the right to refuse this mission on the grounds of being unnecessarily risky.”

“I will go if ordered to,” Rei replies.

Shaking her head, Misato says, “Don’t worry Rei, Unit 00 is incompatible with the D-Type equipment, and now that Shinji has put it that way, I’m scrapping the mission. I’m actually embarrassed to admit that I was too eager to have actually found an Angel in this state that I didn’t actually pause to consider what a blindingly obvious trap this is.”

All around the various techs and tacticians were smacking themselves over having not thought of it like that. Everyone had merely considered the risks of volcano diving and considered it acceptable, and yet somehow no one had raised the rather obvious point that perhaps the reason they had found the Angel sleeping was because it wanted to be found.

Gendo hid his frown behind his gloved hands. He had selected his command staff for myopic brilliance. He wanted them capable of acting flawlessly in the moment, not figuring out the bigger picture, and for the most part they had done that, but recently they had been getting smarter in ways Gendo did not approve of. And he felt it had to do with his son.

Unfortunately there was dick all Gendo could do about it now, seeing as he had just seen all of his current political capital go up in a puff of smoke. He had had to talk the members of SEELE into this plan, and now his pilots and senior command staff had just rejected it. If he pushed now there was a severe risk of mutiny, and the only people with the resources to put it down properly would just laugh at him.

His son had just torpedoed months of work, and it would take weeks, if not months to recover enough to move against the little bastard. Mostly because Gendo now wondered if the boy had been compromised by SEELE. This was not a frustration he needed right now.

“We need to turn the trap in on itself,” Misato says, musingly. “We need to lure the Angel to the surface where it won’t have the home field advantage.”

“Personally I’m all for shoving an N2 mine in one of those probes and sending it down as low as it can go. The blast might not do anything to the Angel, but it will sure as hell let it know that we’re not falling for its bullshit. Then, when it surfaces to play, we just shoot it from the high ground of the crater,” Asuka suggests.

Everyone looks at her funnily before she says, “Alright! I rushed in last time! I learned my lesson, okay?”

Beaming proudly at his student, Shinji says, “Actually, I like her idea. It’s simple, elegant, and even if we have to fight the Angel in its mature form, at least we don’t have to dive into a hostile environment.”

“Simple plans are best,” Rei chips in.

“We’ll need to figure out the proper yield… detonating a nuclear scale weapon has never been attempted inside an active volcano for obvious reasons, but I think we can come up with something that will work,” Ritsuko says, giving the scientific approval.

Sighing quietly at the complete ruination of his reputation, Gendo says, “Then proceed.”


The detonation of the N2 mine in Mount Asama was to a certain degree anticlimactic considering what was happening, namely a huge bomb was being detonated deep inside a volcano. Immediately after the detonation an enormous plume of lava was thrown high into the air and there was a significant earthquake as the mountain shifted and groaned, new cracks opening up and leaking glowing rock out into the air. All across the area hot springs went into over drive as the earth quaked and rocked, releasing scalding hot boiling water and toxic gases.

But the onsen of the region had already been completely evacuated, and in fact all across the country people had been advised of the detonation and asked to stay clear of any hot springs until further notice. After about five minutes the rumblings of the earth died down, and an hour later except for the new, now mostly dead, lava flows, it would be hard to tell that anything had actually happened.

“Okay, we’re on stand-by until further notice. We stay here for at most a week to see if, by some stroke of luck we actually killed the Angel, before returning to Tokyo-3. Any questions?” Misato asks the Pilots.

“No ma’am,” they answer as one.

“Good, now unfortunately all the hot springs in the region are closed for the next month as the mountain is monitored for any residual activity, so unfortunately none of us can relax in a nice natural bath,” Misato says.

Pouting a bit, Asuka brightens up and says, “Ah well, it’s the Angel’s fault for wrecking all my vacation plans. I’ll just have to make sure it suffers for annoying me.”

Her face blank, Rei says, “I had no interest in bathing in any case.”

Shrugging, Shinji says, “There’s always another day.”

Misato just glared at them all before saying, “I wanted to go.”

Shaking her head, she says, “Go have fun you three. We’ve probably got a lot of long, boring waiting around doing nothing ahead of us.”

“We will find a way to pass the time,” Rei replies.


The three Children had found a nice, secluded mountain grove to practice their “extracurricular studies”. Shinji had already give Asuka a few private lessons on telepathy and telekinesis, but so far she had proven difficult to get into the proper mindset. She just could not achieve the proper emotional state to unlock her powers.

She held back, she was hesitant when around Shinji. He could piss her off, but he could not push her to the depths of fury she needed, and neither he nor Rei could really help guide her. They could tell her how they focused, but she was ill suited to their cooler mentalities, so she had to find her own path.

So Shinji let Rei spar with Asuka and told her to really annoy her. Rei had begun by kissing Shinji on the cheek and then grabbing his butt. That began a truly volcanic duel between the two of them with their wooden practice weapons. Rei had had a custom wooden sword made for her, an approximation of a weapon that was best described as an oversized butcher’s cleaver. If actually made, the weapon would be slow, imprecise, and absurdly brutal.

Rei was actually holding her own against the more experience melee combatant, but that was because she was willing to take hits Asuka wasn’t. Already several of her teeth littered the ground, but she was regenerating them at a phenomenal rate, which only served to piss Asuka off even more.

For his part, Shinji was trying to detect the presence of the Angel. As usual the damn things were hard to locate psychically, although this time he wasn’t quite sure if that was because it was dead or not. The worst problem was of course that since the thing had been dormant at the time of the detonation he had no real base-line for comparison.

And then there were two simultaneous psychic spikes. The first one was Asuka suddenly lashing out at Rei after being knocked off her feet by an unpleasant blow to the shin. Rei was hurled across the clearing and would probably have broken something if not for Shinji idly catching her with his own telekinesis.

The second psychic spike was accompanied by Mount Asama blowing its top, spewing a huge cone of brilliant orange lava into the air, lighting up the twilight sky more spectacularly than the floodlights of the nearby NERV mobile command centre.

The fact that this explosion was backlighting Asuka’s triumphant victory cry was not lost on the two people watching.

“You look insane,” Rei commented.

Asuka just glared at her.

“Quiet you two. We have other things to worry about. I’m pretty sure the Eight Angel just woke up and he’s pissed we didn’t take the bait,” Shinji says while beginning the trek back down to the base.


The caldera of the mountain was filled with a lake of lava that was steadily rising and explosively boiling, while the Evas were stationed in a line along one edge, loaded out for ranged combat.

Asuka had her bolt pistol holstered and her chain axe slung across her back, just in case the Angel that emerged wanted to go hand to hand immediately, but her primary weapon out at the moment was a bolter with underslung melta, matching the one in Unit 01’s hands. Unit 01 had the missile pods strapped onto its shoulders, the incendiaries swapped out for what would best be described of as “cryo-bombs”. They contained liquid nitrogen under very high pressure and rigged to be explosively expelled in a manner such that it caused further cooling. The theory was that if the Angel could survive in magma, then it probably would not respond very well to sudden thermal shocks.

Rei, in Unit 00, was armed with the newest model of the positron cannon, although this one was significantly improved. Using the technology appropriated from the JSSDF, the NERV weapons designers had built a potent continuous beam weapon that required a prohibitively large power supply. The engineers from the remains of the Jet Alone project however had used their expertise to build a compact nuclear reactor that could be mounted on an Eva to provide power for the gun.

So the three Evas waited quietly, lava bombs raining down on them only to splatter harmlessly off their AT-fields, and while the ground trembled beneath them with the activity occurring within the volcano, their enormous legs absorbed even the largest swells with no effort. They looked like three bored sailors standing in the rain. Only the rain was glowing orange and cherry red in the night.

And then what appeared to be an eyestalk emerged from the lake of lava and looked at them. Asuka was about ready open fire when Shinji stopped her. At best they would damage the eye, which the Angel could simply regenerate at its leisure by diving back beneath the surface of the lava. They would wait.

What emerged was nothing like what they were expecting. The reason that the lava lake had been rising was because the Angel was pushing up from underneath and was nearly as large as the caldera. Its body was hard to describe, as it was covered in a thick layer of molten rock that clung to it as armour, but the best general description was of a trilobite… the size of a small mountain… and covered in lava and yet unharmed.

It spat a long stream of molten rock up at the Evas, the arc slow and lazy at this range, and they easily stepped aside. Opening fire they sent dozens of bolters rounds down into the creature and a long beam of bright blue-white plasma. The bolts merely blew off chunks of the lava, while the plasma beam boiled off a bit of rock. Despite being on the top, the layer of lava armour quickly reformed, evidently being supplied by the Angel rather than the volcano.

Reaching out a long, spindly, orange appendage, the Angel dug into the solid rock outside the lake and began to pull itself out of the caldera. More limbs began to appear, slowly hauling the beast up the side of the mountain. It was slow, but that was because it was dragging its stomach along the ground. And it was doing that so that it would always have a fresh supply of lava, because everything it touched simply melted.

“Well… shit,” Shinji commented.

“Pull back while laying down a hail of defensive fire with your guns. I hate to surrender the high ground, but so long as that thing is in the crater it will have a free supply of lava,” Misato orders.

“Affirmative,” Shinji states, giving the occasional tap to his trigger to keep the bastard’s attention. Its lava armour was simply absorbing the shots, preventing any actual damage to the creature’s own armour. They waited calmly until the Angel was in accurate lava spitting range before abandoning the edge of the caldera and withdrawing a good distance down mountain. They had no idea what the Angel would do once it got the high ground.

Cresting the edge of the caldera, the Angel hauled itself up before it came crashing down, to slide on a layer of lava down the slope of the mountain directly towards the Evas. Abandoning their positions with maximum haste, they break for the sides. Unfortunately Shinji, in the central position, is just a touch too slow and his trailing leg gets caught beneath the bulk of the bulk of the creature.

When his tumbling, crashing descent finished all that remained of Unit 01’s left leg was a lava encrusted stump above the knee. Unit 02, which was closest to him, snatched the now immobilized Eva away from a descending leg that would have skewered it otherwise.

“Are you okay Shinji?” Asuka asked.

Wincing over the phantom pain in his leg and the real pain from being thrown about his entry plug, Shinji says, “I’ll survive.”

While the Evas regrouped, the Angel began to dig itself into the ground, not stopping until it had its entire lower half hidden beneath the surface, and then it began to crawl forward, ploughing through the ground towards the distant Tokyo-3.

“Okay, experiment time kids. Shinji, I want you to fire off a quarter of your cryo-missiles followed by a barrage of your hellfire missiles and rounds from your guns. Rei, I want you to hold off with the positron rifle until there is bare flesh exposed, got that?” Misato orders.

“Affirmative,” they all chime in.

Detonating over the surface of the lava armour, the cryo-missiles flash froze the lava into hard, brittle rock that burst off into huge slabs the moment the bolter rounds struck it, instead of just blowing off little blobs of lava. This exposed the glowing exoskeletal armour beneath, and while the bolters mostly just bounced off the tough, angled armour, the positron rifle cut deep into the Angel.

Screeching in pain, the Angel dug its rearmost limbs into its lava pillow and hurled up a huge spray of lava, tens of thousands of tons at the very least of liquid hot rock. Throwing up their AT-fields, they formed a wall that caught the tsunami of fire. Shoving it off of them, they moved, Unit 02 supporting Unit 01, to a position away from the rear of the Angel.

As they moved to the side, the legs started throwing up more globs of lava. While they could simply block the attacks with their own AT-fields, they were extremely distracting as they demanded a response, for to be hit by one of those things directly was asking for pain.

“The front maybe? It can’t slide down a mountain again like it did before,” Asuka suggests.

After it spit at them a wave of lava only slightly smaller than the one thrown up by when they attacked from the rear, the Evas all retreated away to a safe distance to reconsider their options.

“Okay, I’ve still got plenty of missiles, and we have two melta shots left, what can we do with all that?” Shinji asks.

“We could use a melta blast to strip off the outer layer of lava armour and then pound on the creature with everything we’ve got, hopefully causing enough damage to force a regeneration cycle. The Angels have unlimited energy supplies but not unlimited power, and generating all that lava has got to eat up a lot of power. With any luck when it settles in to regenerate it will stop producing lava and we can simply pummel it to death like we usually do,” Misato suggests.

“Sounds like a plan,” Shinji notes. “Beginning priming sequence.”

The moment Shinji began to prime his melta for firing, the Angel stopped and abruptly began to burrow into the ground, the lava armour about it clearly swelling up even thicker.

“Son of a bitch! Quick, let’s open up a hole in its armour now!” Shinji cries out, firing all of his missiles at once while opening up with his bolter. Joining in, the two other blew off a huge chunk of the armour and tried to cut deep, but the thing just kept burrowing and thickening the lava about itself.

“Fire in the hole!” Shinji cries out as he activates his melta. For a moment night became day as the directed thermonuclear explosion flashed out to consume the Angel, but when the glare died down, it was still there, it’s armour only partly stripped away except for about the area where they had already hit it, which was now a heavily wounded scar.

The Angel reared up out of its hole and continued moving. The wound was already being covered over.

“Damn it! This thing just shrugs off whatever we throw at it!” Misato cries out over the radio.

“We need to deliver an overwhelming blow point blank to it,” Asuka notes.

“Okay, pull back and we’ll rearm you all and try and come up with another plan of attack,” Misato orders.

Asuka was pissed that this thing was just shrugging them off like this. There had to be some thing…

She suddenly had a moment of utter clarity, the world slowing down to a stand-still as her brain began to process events at a phenomenally fast rate. She suddenly discovered a new way of looking at things, her rage compressing in on itself from opaque coal into a crystal clear diamond.

The Angel could easily dive beneath the surface of the rock and be completely immune to their attack, but that would take forever to melt through, so it was merely skimming along. But if it hit softer ground, then it could simply dive beneath and move quickly and safely. It would then head for Tokyo-3 and the Geofront and attack… whatever it was there that drew the Angels, and they wouldn’t be able to stop it.

They had to finish it now.

The only weapon they had that they could hope to kill this thing was the melta in her Eva’s hands. But it would do them little good as they had to first use it to cut through the lava armour. If only they had a breach already…

“Cover me,” Asuka says in a flat tone before ejecting her umbilical cable and sprinting out ahead of the others, adroitly dodging the house sized lava bombs being hurled her way. Taking her bolter in a single handed grip and drawing her pistol, Asuka began firing everything she had at the head of the beast.

“Smile, you son of a bitch!” Asuka cries out while rushing the monster, and is rewarded with it opening its mouth to spit a huge wave of lava at her. Angling her AT-field like a cattle catcher on a train and simply ploughed through the attack to leap guns blazing head first into the Angel’s mouth, melta already priming.

“Asuka!” Shinji shouted out as he watched her do that.

For several seconds nothing happened, and then the entire rear half of the Angel was blown apart in a shower of lava and gore while the front half was lifted into the air and thrown upside down onto a nearby mountain, its belly glowing white hot. Again for several seconds nothing happened, and then the Angel began to twitch, its limbs flailing about in the air as it attempted to right itself.

Then its entire body went into a spasm, once, twice, three times. From a section on its stomach a whirring chainsaw blade burst out and cut a circle out of the Angel before descending back in. A huge spherical chunk of the Angel was then hurled out of way and the Angel stopped struggling completely. Evidentially that had been its core.

Its armour glowing and half molten, Unit 02 crawled out of the hole and raised its chain axe over its head, bellowing to the night sky that it had won. It then took a few steps before tumbling down the side of the now slowly cooling corpse, sliding on the viscous lava down to the ground where Unit 00 was waiting to catch it, Unit 01 crawling along as quickly as it could with only one leg.

Setting the damaged Eva aside to let it cool, Unit 00 takes the ejected entry plug and sets it safely to the side while Unit 01 ejects its own plug so that Shinji can rush out to see Asuka.

Rather woozy from the adrenaline rush and the heat flush, Asuka totters out of her entry plug only for Shinji to slap her across the face and demand angrily, “What the fuck were you thinking?”

“I… I did what I had to do, just like how you blew yourself up to take out Shamshel,” Asuka says in a daze.

“It’s called the ‘Shinji Suicide Special’ for a reason,” Shinji points out angrily.

Grinning, Asuka replies, “Well they can call it the ‘Soryu Suicide Special’ now.”

Tears of fear, sadness, and happiness running down his face, Shinji finally just says, “Oh, screw it, just kiss me.”

He then embraces Asuka tightly before grabbing her by the butt to lift her off the ground, her legs wrapping about his waist for extra support.

From Unit 00 Rei watches down over the two of them, and smiles. Shinji had told her long ago that he really thought of her in a sisterly sense, evidently his instincts were quite good at locating his own blood, and in truth she felt sisterly towards him too. The passion of romance was not something in her, although she did admit that now that he had awoken in her an emotional aspect she did long for him in ways she never would have thought of before.

It did not matter. Shinji was not replaceable like her, so his happiness took precedence, and he was clearly very happy at the moment. And as much as she had considered letting the berserker boil in her Eva so that she could take her place, Shinji’s happiness was tied to Asuka’s wellbeing at the moment.

At the moment. Things changed, fell apart, and people died. Rei could endure all those things, and she had the patience to see this through to the end.

She had infinite patience.

[Sidewinder]

A good start to the battle with Sandalphon. What's next? Shinji using psychokinesis to lift the Angel out of the magma/lava to make it vulnerable?

I'm still hoping that Asuka will make Rei bathe/shower more regularly. Bad personal hygiene is SUCH a turn off.