Home
Part 22
Shinji was mad. Very, very mad, as a matter of fact. Unit 5 dared to
attack Asuka?! The thought of it was inconceivable, to say the least.
But now, now he was going to show them just how wrong they were to try
that.
Never before had he felt such anger. Never towards his father. Never
to the Angels. Never to Seele, those old men who controlled the whole
thing.
His entire body was vibrating with anger. Holding onto the Lance, it
seemed, made it easier to feel angry. He didn't mind. The weapon was
filled with energy, radiating it like a beacon. Shinji drank it up,
all of it. He would need it for what was coming.
He stood facing the two Eva's, although he was leaning heavily on the
Lance. His body was riddled with dozens of small dents and cuts, but
his torso had two very large holes in it. It was those two wounds that
made standing such a problem.
Unit 5, who'd up to now only looked at everything with contempt and
disdain, was openly wary of Unit 1, though it was directed more to the
weapon it wielded than the machine itself. Right at the moment, it was
unsure of what to do, now that the tables had been turned so radically,
and was currently stalling for time, hoping that its comrades-in-arms could
join the fight and overwhelm Unit 1 with sheer numbers.
Inside Central Dogma, Misato was having trouble understanding what was
going on, and was having even more trouble understanding how it was
happening. Shinji was hit by the Lance of Longinus, and by all rights
he should be dead. 'Wait a minute,' Misato thought to herself. 'Unit 1
was hit by the Lance. By all rights he should be dead,' she argued before
telling herself to shut up and stop trying to decide why Shinji should
be dead. So, for a better answer, she turned to Ritsuko and asked her.
"I have no idea," she answered. "Really, I don't know," she added when
she saw Misato's scowl. "I don't know how he could be moving. We all
saw what that thing did to Unit 7 when it was hit by it."
"Could it have something to do with Shinji's high synch ratio with Unit
1?" Misato asked, her tone one step down from a demand.
"It's the only possible answer I can think of," Ritsuko said, lying
through her teeth. 'There is one more reason out there,' she thought
to herself before glancing for a moment up at the Commanders, who where
still at their spire, having not moved from that place since the first
break-in occurred. Fuyutsuki scowled for a moment before turning to Commander
Ikari, who did nothing.
"Do you intend to not tell them?" Fuyutsuki asked after a moments
hesitation.
"Do you even need to ask that question?" the Supreme Commander
countered dryly, not really expecting an answer.
"Considering your latest decisions? Yes," Fuyutsuki answered, even
though he knew the Commander's question was rhetorical. "I wonder what Seele
is thinking about the turn of events."
"Probably rearranging schedules and timetables, among other things."
"What other things? Re-enforcement's? More troops for the UN? A long
range attack?"
"All of the above, and more, probably."
"Oh," was all Fuyutsuki could say without giving away the wonder that
was now taking hold of his mind. For a few moments he considered what
forms of attacks Seele would send. "How long?"
"Probably no more than ten minutes. Maybe less," was the answer. Not
what Fuyutsuki wanted to hear.
"What will we do about them?"
"At the moment? Nothing. We are going to have to wait and see what
develops from this change of odds."
"Oh, by the way," Fuyutsuki said after a moment of thought. "You might
want to tell those agents of yours to deactivate those bombs you had
planted around the project." To this, the Commander raised an eyebrow.
"What makes you think I haven't already?"
"I've been watching you since Unit 5 landed in the Geofront. You
flipped a switch in your desk drawer when it threw the Lance. You haven't done
anything to counteract that order. Besides, after knowing you for so
many years, I like to think I know a few things about you," Fuyutsuki
finished, a playful tone in his voice.
"Very good, Professor. But you are correct, I haven't given the order
to deactivate those explosives. If Unit 1 should loose the fight, I doubt
the rest of us will survive long enough to reactivate them."
"True," the older man conceded, but continued on, "though it looks like
Shinji will now win the fight, him having the Lance and all."
Commander Ikari said nothing of this, but did nod a little. "As well, what are
we going to do now that Shinji knows of Seele? And god knows what else he
knows at the moment."
"Come now, Fuyutsuki, you heard him as well as everyone else did; he
might not survive this fight."
"Yes, but that was before he obtained the Lance." Again Commander
Ikari lapsed into silence.
The object of their words, Unit 1, was contemplating what to do. He
knew he should attack them outright, but something else was nagging at the
back of his mind. He knew he should know what it was, be he couldn't figure
it out. He knew it had something do with the face that he now had the
Lance and all the power it held. He knew he should use that power for
something, anything before the other UN Eva's arrived.
If the others got there, Shinji knew, then he'd be hard pressed to stop
them all, even though he did have the Lance. It was all of those darn
dents and cuts in his body. They didn't impede motion or anything,
they just hurt. One or two of them didn't really matter, but all of them
combined made for a painful reminder of how the battle had been going
before he got the Lance.
There was no sudden flash of inspiration, no lightbulb popping into
existence over his head, but instead, a slow realization of what he was
going to do.
Getting a better grip on the Lance, using both hands, he held it in
front of himself and closed his eyes. Reaching down inside of himself, he
summoned pure energy to the surface. Before, he was using his energy
simply to move and attack and defend. Now he put it to a different
use.
Instead of focusing it outward, like in an attack, he instead channeled
back through his own body. The result of it was, in a wave of purple
playing on the outside of his body, all the dents flattened out and
filled in; all the cuts sealed themselves; and all the holes simply. ceased to
be.
All this happened in the space of a couple of heartbeats. With one,
actually two, exceptions:
The two holes in his torso made by the Lance of Longinus stayed. Not
even the outer armour sealed over them.
"What?!" Misato exclaimed.
"At least you didn't say, 'What the hell', eh Katsuragi?" Kaji said,
quietly though, because even he was awed by the sight of Unit 1
regenerating. She didn't answer him because she was busy looking over
at Ritsuko and Maya, hoping that they would have some sort of explanation.
"Don't bother asking," Ritsuko said, as if she was reading Misato's
mind.
"I have no idea how most of this could happen, nevermind what just
occurred. It might have something to do with Shinji's high ratio with
Unit 1, but without a more detailed analysis, under laboratory conditions I
can't be sure of anything."
"Now what do you think of his chances?" Fuyutsuki asked, a slight
tremor of humour entering his voice. Not surprisingly, he got no answer; not
that he expected any.
Unit 5 and it's companion both growled. They definitly did not like
the turn of events. "Heh, don't like your own trick used against you, do
you?" he asked rhetorically. Now that he was ready to fight, he wasted no
time.
Not even bothering to spare the time to roar, he charged forward with a
renewed vigor as well as body. He took off at a dead run, charging
them, with the Lance held in a ready position. If he thought he was angry
before, then what he felt now couldn't be descibed as anger, it was too
powerful an emotion for such a general description.
He reached the two UN Eva's in record time, and charged right into the
fight. He faked a thrust with the Lance at Unit 5, and stuck his leg
out so it caught Unit 5 when it dodged the Lance. While Unit 5 doubled
over, Shinji wheeled around with the Lance, bringing it over his head in a
wide arc. At the last second, before his enemy could dodge, Shinji reversed
his grip on the Lance, and clubbed the UN Eva over the head with the blunt
end.
It caught the white Eva completely unprepared for such a tactic, and
it fell for it. While it doubled over, Shinji brought the Lance back up
at it, it's twin prongs carving deep lines in the torso of the enemy.
Using the upward momentum generated by that last move, Shinji again raised
the Lance in a high arc, continued it until the prongs were facing away
from the Eva, and slammed the blunt end into its midsection.
As that Unit fell, Unit 5 recovered from Shinji's attack and charged,
it's weapon ready. Unit 1 was ready for it, and just before the giant blade
was going to hit Unit 1, he sidestepped out the way and slammed the Lance
into Unit 5's rather large neck. Unfortunatly, Unit 5 moved out of the way,
and the Lance went wide. Shinji dived to the side into a tuck and roll
before Unit 5 could take advantage of his over-reaching. He glanced up in
enough time to see the other UN Eva try to regenerate, but the wounds wouldn't
close. It glanced down, hoping that staring at the problem would make
it go away.
Shinji didn't give it the time, as he charged it. It looked up just in
time to see him coming. Something that sounded halfway between a bleet
and a worried cry escape it's lips. But it's cry didn't impeade it's
survival instinct, and it dodged; somewhat clumsily, but it did escape any
damage directed towards it.
Unit 5, who'd until now been a team player, looked at the odds,
extended it's wings, and took off, up the same shaft that it'd entered; leaving
it's partner to Unit 1's attacks. Unit 10 only stared after it for a moment
before taking action itself by following Unit 5 and flying out the
shaft.
"Hey! Where do you think you're going?!" Shinji asked rhetorically as
he charged Unit 10, and nearly missed it as it deployed it's wings and
flew up the shaft. With one hand holding onto the Lance, he only had one hand
to hold onto Unit 10.
Unit 10, none to happy at having a passenger, tried everything it could
to shake Shinji off. It tried rolling around in the shaft, though it ran
out of room with that trick. It flew closer to wall of the shaft, and
grated Shinji along it, hoping that the friction would pull him off. Crying
out in pain, Shinji held on for dear life. He knew that if he fell off,
the UN Eva's would have a chance to regroup and make some sort of defense.
Though the pain was incredable, he managed to hold on. Just barely; several
times he almost lost his grip.
The other Eva's finally succeeded in opening a hole in the armour
plating over the shaft. And just in time, too, because Unit 5 came punching
out of the too-small hole mear moments after, the jagged edges carving deep
lines into the white armour of the flying Eva. The others scattered to what
was left of the surrounding buildings.
Unfortunatly for Unit 10, it ran out of shaft before it could try
removing Shinji again. As soon as his vehicle was out in the open, Shinji jumped
off of it's back, flipped in the air, and landed on one of the Eva's that
were still trying to hide behind one of the buildings. Unable to bring the
Lance to bear, Shinji settled for simply driving it to the ground and
rolled off.
He didn't stop there and turned around, brought the Lance up, and
stabbed down. Unit 9 brought it's arms up, trying to catch the Lance like
Shinji did, missed, and cried out in pain as the twin prongs were forced into
it's neck. Blood spurted everywhere. It spasmed twice, before going
silent, never to move again.
"That's one down, only six more to go," Shinji said, his voice thick
with satisfaction, and he turned around to find the others. As he completed
his turn, he had to duck under a slash from Unit 8's broad blade.
Apparently, it decided that the only way to survive was to take the battle to Unit
1. Shinji didn't mind one bit, as it meant that he didn't have to go after
that Eva.
Unit 8 was relentless in it's attacks, never giving Shinji more than a
few seconds between each attack, though it missed each time. From his
perspective, Unit 8's stabs were clumsy and ineffective at doing the
slightest bit of damage. However, he did have to concede that the
attacks did stop him from making his own.
Shinji continued to leap, dance, and pirouette out of the way several
times before an opening of attack presented itself. After turning to
the side to avoid a vertical slash, he completed the turn and put his other
hand on the Lance, holding it with both. In the same motion, he
stabbed forward, impaling Unit 8 in the torso with the red weapon.
Grinning widly, Shinji lifted the Lance up with Unit 8 still on the end
of it. Gravity beat friction, and the white Eva started sliding down the
Lance, leaving blood all over the Lance. It too spasmed a few times,
but it did managed to grasp the Lance and push itself back up a few meters
before it finally died. Shinji reversed the Lance so it was pointed
down, but a foot on Unit 8 and pushed it off the Lance.
"That's two," he said, fully intent on counting each one of the
remaining units as they died.
"What do you think now, Ikari?" Fuyutsuki asked again. Again, he got
no answer. The rest of the staff in the room, however, were quite verbal
in their apprasial of Shinji's work. Cheers and shouts erupted every time
Shinji made a successful attack, though there was a fair amount of
people making sounds like they were sick when Shinji lifted the impaled Unit 8
up.
It seemed that when he had the Lance, Unit 1 got more and more brutal.
For confermation of this, one only had to look at what he was doing
now.
Misato stared at the screen, hoping that this new level of brutality
was only caused by the Lance, and wasn't something that was always lurking
around in Shinji's head, and he was only giving vent to it. She risked
a glance at Asuka and the other pilots, only to see Toji and Rei talking
quietly to themselves. From what she could hear, they were discussing
Shinji's chances. Asuka on the other hand, seemed to be somewhat
oblivious to the battle; a sharp contrast to what she'd been doing a few minutes
ago.
'What is she thinking?' Misato asked herself, before getting up the
courage to walk over there and ask the younger girl.
"Nothing that's your business," Asuka replied somewhat tartly. "And I
do doubt," she went on, quietly so that no one else could hear, "that
you'll ever find out. It's personal, so I suggest you drop it."
Misato rocked back on her heels, somewhat stunned by the redhead's
response. She wondered how personal it could be to warrent such a
response. But, then again, such a response was new to the girl. It was
the tone, however, that made Misato blink. Asuka's voice was pitched in
such a way that it garunteed the subject was closed. Asuka gestured toward
the main screen, and Misato looked back at it.
What she saw was that Shinji had another Eva, Unit 11, trapped between
two buildings. "What? Now that you've lost the upper hand you cower?" he
demanded, insenced that his opponents were really that spinless.
Before, when Unit 5 had the Lance, they seemed unstoppable. But now that the
Lance changed hands, their true nature was revealed. "Come and fight me like
you did!" Unfortunatly for him, he got his wish.
They came at him from all sides, the remaining Evas. Unit 5, of
course, was not with them. It was hovering far away enough so that it wasn't
part of the battle, growling like mad; issuing orders for the others to kill
Unit 1. Shinji, happy now that the others had decided to take him on in a
stand-up fight, was unimpressed with how they were going about it. They were so
close to him and each other that they couldn't use their blades to
their maximum potential. The down side to that was that they were so close
that he couldn't bring the Lance into play, and was stuck dodging their
akward attacks.
He parried and dodged for all he was worth when a thought occured to
him.
When the next opportunity presented itself, he reached out and grabbed
the nearest UN Eva, Unit 11 with one hand, while deflecting a punch with
the Lance in the other hand. Twisting Unit 11's arm so it's elbow faced
down, he lept up and slammed his knee into it. Elbows weren't meant to bend
that way, and it snapped with a wet crunch. While Unit 11 tried to
regenerate it, he pulled the Unit past himself and slammed it into one that was
behind himself. While the two Units fell into a pile, he turned his attention
to the two left in front of himself. Whipping the Lance into a ready
position in both hands, he stabbed forward, catching the two Eva's on the end of
the red weapon; one impaled on each of the prongs. He quickly pulled it
out of the bodies, and while such a shallow blow was insuffecient to kill each
of the angels, it was enough to seriously damage them.
As soon as the Lance left their bodies, the two damaged Eva's sank to
the ground, twitching in their pain. Shinji resolved to put them out of
their misery, and his, incidently. He stabbed one in the head with the
Lance, barely taking notice of its death throws. The other one, he picked up
off the ground with one hand, he threw it into the other two, who'd
untangled themselves. The impact drove the three of the to the ground, where
they had to start all over again.
"Three and four," Shinji said, adding Unit 11 to his list of
casutlties.
"Only three left." He lept after Unit 10, and landed on the
half-standing Unit 6, sending it down for a third time. He brought the blunt end of
the Lance around and smashed it into Unit 12's side. He swung it around
and did the same to the other side of it's torso. He noticed some movement
behind him, and turned around to see Unit 6 trying to swipe at his legs
with its blade. He v-stepped out of the way and brought his elbow down
on the back of its huge head. As it fell forward, he slammed his knee
into it's face, sending it crashing on it's back to the ground.
He stepped on its torso, pinning it to the ground with his foot. It
opened it's mouth to scream out a war cry, and Unit 1 rewarded it by
stabbing the Lance right down it's open throat and out the back of it's
head, silencing it forever.
"Five."
"We know, we know. Could you just get back to work?" Misato asked,
tired of his frequent pauses. Still, she had to admit that he was doing a
tremendous job. He'd done in the last few minutes by himself what the
four of them hadn't been able to do since the start of the operation.
"Yes, ma'am!" he said with heavy emphasis on the 'ma'am', barely able
to resist the terrible urge to click his heels together and salute. "And
would also like wine with that?" he asked before leaping back into the
fray. "Nevermind," he said as he landed, "I forgot that you only go
for the really hard stuff. I'm all out of that at the moment."
Misato could feel her eyebrow starting to twitch in anger. The rest of
the crew had huge grins all over their faces, even Rei, though hers was
much smaller. Fuyutsuki didn't bother trying to hide his. Commander
Ikari only sighed a little. Misato swept her gaze along the three bridge
officers in front of her, demanding if they'd just heard what was said.
"No, ma'am," they all chorused together, not wanting to know what would
happen if they said yes. Misato didn't even bother turning towards
Kaji; she knew what his answer would be.
Shinji landed between Unit's 10 and 12. Thrusting forward with the
Lance and kicking backwards, he managed to drive the two of them apart. The
thrust missed, but the kcik connected. Unit 10 flew backwards into a
skyscraper, cavin in one section. With that Eva out of play for the
next few moments, Shinji turned his attention fully on Unit 12.
He swept the Lance down in a low arc, sweeping Unit 12's legs out from
under it. For the fourth time, it met the ground. But before Unit 1
could act on it, he was slammed from behind, being knocked over himself.
Apparently Unit 10 had extracated itself from the building and deployed
its wings to ram Shinji.
Unit 1 hit the ground in a somersault and rolled to his feet.
Amazingly enough, he managed to keep his grasp of the Lance throughout the entire
manouver. He turned around just in time to see the two white Eva's
charge him, trying to doubleteam him.
One of them lept at him, the other dived at his feet. He sidestepped
out of the way and slammed the Lance down on the exposed back of Unit 10.
It fell right on top of Unit 12. Holding the Lance high above his head,
he summomed up all the strength that he could.
And drove the Lance through both Eva's, pinning them to the ground.
Shinji opened his mouth to speak, but Misato interuppted him. "That's
six and seven. We know," she said, her tone going slightly frosty. Shinji
suddenly realized that he was breathing very heavily; panting for air.
During the fight he hadn't noticed. He didn't give himself the time to
catch his breath though.
"One more," he growled out. Unit 5 was still hovering in the air when
Shinji finally turned around to look at it. "So? You coming or not?"
he asked rhetorically, not really wanting an answer. As he moved closer
to Unit 5, it moved backwards, openly wary of this prey that had suddenly
and completely become the predator. "Oh, don't tell me that you've
suddenly become a coward. Come and get what you so richly diserve," he said,
his voice barely above a growl. As he was walking towards it, he began to
take notice of where they were headed. He realized that this is where Unit
2 had finally falled to the onslaught of the UN Eva's and it's pilot had
to be tricked into leaivng the fight. 'Asuka,' Shinji thought to himself.
"Major! Shinji's synch ratio with Unit 1! It's getting higher!"
"How high is it going?"
"It's up at 600%" Maya said, worry starting to creep into her voice.
The mathmatics that defined the Synch Ratio got fuzzy around this point,
the reality of it began to break down at this point. It couldn't be to
conductive to his health to be at this level for long.
"How high can he go without suffuring permanant damage?" Misato queried
Ritsuko.
"It used to be a hundred. That was the safe limit, though at the time
it was impossible to reach," Ritsuko replied, somewhat dryly.
For Shinji, for some reason, it was getting to be harder and harder to
remember some of the names attached to the faces that were dancing in
front of his eyes. The closer he got to Unit 5, his target, his enemy, the
more indistinct those last links to his life got.
He was having trouble remembering that man, the one who's eyes always
seemed to be dark.
He couldn't remember everything about that young man who'd meant to
much to him; more a brother than a friend.
He couldn't remember what that older womans' laugh sounded like, no
matter how slurred by alcohol.
He couldn't remember what shade of white that old man's hair was.
He couldn't remember how red that other girl's eyes were, no matter how
hard he tried.
But the thing that infuriated him the most, was that he couldn't even
remember what face went with the name he just thought a few moments
ago.
He cast a glance around his surroundings, because he knew that they had
some connection with that name. It wasn't until his gaze finally
settled on his fallen comrade, Unit 2.
What was wrong with it? Why wouldn't it move?
As Unit 1 walked closer to it, he could see that there was a section
missing from it's back. At that point, he knew that the critical
component that made it work was missing; foribly, it seemed. He had to stop and
look at it's colour for a moment. Something about had to do with that name.
He knew the name had something to do with fire; perhaps it was her
temper.
Or hair. Or clothes. He couldn't decide which it was. But for the
moment, knowing that red had something to do with her was enough for
him.
With that thought firmly in mind, he turned back to his enemy, who was
still hovering above the air, just slightly out of reach. Just enough
to be an annoyance, but little more.
By the time that he got close enough that he could've reached out with
the Lance and touched the white one, Unit 1 was no longer thinking in terms
or words or images. Simply emotions and instincts. For him, it was
instinctive to hate that winged thing. For him, it was instinctive to
try to remove that hated thing. For him, it was instinctive that
everything be around him be sacraficed to that end.
A foreign thought tried to say something about that last one, something
about keeping someone safe, not using them to defeat Unit 5, but Unit 1
simply pushed it aside. He promisied to himself to ponder that later,
after he did what he had to. Lifting the Lance as if it weighed
nothing, he started to attack when the Hated One struck first.
Apparently getting some backbone back, it decided to attack with all
it's heart, to try and win. Unit 1 wasn't about to give it that chance.
Shifting his stance from one of offence to defence, he stood ready to
accept the challange, to fight it for all he was worth. And to win.
Nothing would stop him. He wouldn't let it.
Some would've called that an honourable fight: two beings, so alike and
yet so differnet, fighting for all they're worth, with only one able to
emerge victorious. But Unit 1 knew better; he knew that his opponent
would try every underhanded and dirty trick that it could. Well, that was
alright with him; two could play at that game.
It's attacks were faster than the others, but still not so fast that
Unit 1 couldn't stop them. He blocked and parried while sending a few of
his own attacks back. But they were no more of an annoyance that the
Enemy's were. It was suddenly changing tactics from what it normally used, to
what he did earler in the fight. It was doing it's best to stay as close as
possibe, to limit his use of the Lance. Stalemate.
Bringing the two prongs of the Lance up over his head, trying to drive
them into the Hated One's head, he was ready for it's block. When it
did bring up its blade to block it, he brought the blunt end of the Lance
to bear and buried into his opponents' midsection. Not stopping there, he
also brought the Lance around and smashed into the Other's kneecaps,
shattering them.
Even though the Lance didn't penatrate the outer armour, it still took
the other one time to grow it back. And in that time, Unit 1 took action.
Bouncing away, he charged toward Unit 2. After reaching it, he wasted
no time. He put his hand on its right shoulder pylon, and ripped off the
cover for the Progressive Knife stored within and placed it within his
own pylon.
By the time he had it in his right hand and returned to the fight, Unit
5 had completely regerated all damage.
Moving slowly as to insure that there was no mistaking his intentions,
Unti 1 held the Lance out in front of himself. Then he slammed the end
of the Lance into the ground.
The Hated One inclined its head, trying to understand. Then it slowly
dawned on it, and it growled a consent.
Misato was totally lost, wondering what the hell Shinji had in mind.
She asked him as much. All she got back were growls and laboured
breathing.
Not only from the comms channel, but they could see it on the screen.
Whenever Shinji growled, Unit 1 did the same.
"Shinji! Answer me! What are you doing?"
"Grrrr," came the soft reply.
"Ikari? What's happening?" Fuyutsuki asked quietly.
"The same thing that happend thirteen years ago, Professor," the other
answered just as quietly.
"You mean...."
"Yes. He's being absorbed by Unit 1."
"How do we stop it?"
"We can't."
"Is it can't, or won't?" There was no answer to that. Again.
On the screen, the two combatants came together and parted several
times, each trying for the right position that would allow it to win. Each
time they came together, the upper hand changed a dozen times in half as
many seconds. Each time they came apart, they readied themselves to clash
again with renewed vigor.
Finally, after several minutes of this, Unit 1 got a lucky blow in, an
uppercut to the chin of Unit 5. As it reeled back, Unit 1 pressed the
advantage, getting several more blows in before it pulled out the
progressive knife it'd stored earler.
Using all of it's monsterous strenght, Unit 1 drove the knife into the
abdomen of Unit 5, sinking it all the way to the hilt.
Unit 5 roared in pain.
Unit 1 roared in victory. It drew the knife all the way across to the
other side of Unit 5, opening it up. He then tossed away the knife,
it's job done. Then he picked up Unit 5, and held it high above his head.
Unit 1 held it there for a moment, holding the Hated One in a place
where it knew it's demise was coming, and savored the feeling it produced.
Then he dropped to his right knee, and brought his enemy down on his knee
guard in a punishing backbreaker with a roar that all of the other Eva's
combined couldn't have hoped to match.
The cut he made ealier with the knife hadn't had enough time to
completely regenerate, and allowed the White One's body to hyper-extended. It's
soft, moist, red insides displayed themselves for all to see after the armour
finally snapped apart after several creaking tries at staying together.
Unit 1 stared at the sight for a moment, before giving fully to his
bestal instincts. He threw his head down and gorged on the soft flesh of the
enemy. The meat was warm, driving away all of the coldness that had
run rampant through his body.
With crazed abandon, he feasted on the still-warm corpse of the Hated
One.
It's death throws only hightening the experience.
Blood poured down his face, tasting like fine wine, or water to a
thirsty man in a desert.
He lapped, ate, crunched, and tore his way through the flesh, trying to
sate his hunger; but somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew there
would never be enough meat in this body to fill his needs.
Almost everyone in the Control Room watching the spectacle had to cover
their mouths with their hands to keep from throwing up. That didn't
stop some, and there was soon several people doubled over, trying their best
to remove any food from their stomachs. Maya was one of those people, and
while she was out of her chair, Makoto charged over and took her place.
Quickly scanning the displays, he noted something that had to be
brought to attention.
"Major Katsuragi! Unit 1's synch ratio is rising! It's going off the
scale!!"
"That's not possible!!!" Ritsuko yelled, coming over herself to make
sure it was true. Judging by the way all the colour drained from her face,
it was. She threw a glance up at the two Commanders. They knew full well
what this meant.
After the Hated One stopped spasming and died for good, Unit 1 rolled
it off his knee and stood up. Looking up and noting that lightning was
again flashing around himself, he prepared to move out when a flicker of
movement caught his eye.
He watched it come closer and realised what it was. A long tube, with
a huge bulb at one end and several fins at the other.
"It's a missle," Misato said, her voice so strangled at the sight she
just saw that even she didn't recognize it.
"I'm getting some strange readings from it," a tech said. "If I didn't
know any better, I'd say that it was a minature N2 mine mounted on a
Class-2 missle."
"That's impossible! It couldn't be done, we tried!" Fuyutsuki
answered.
"There's the reinforcements," the Supreme Commander commented quietly.
"It looks like we were wrong. It can be done."
The missle streaked closer to Unit 1, who did nothing.
"Shinji! Put up your field! Stop that missle!" Misato only got
static, punctuated by some more growling for an answer. "Shinji! That's a
direct order! Do it now!" The closer the missle got, the more insistant
Misato yelled, but she got no answer. She turned angrily to Asuka, who was
watching the screen, ignoring everything else. "Asuka! Do something!
Make him deploy his field!"
"How?" The question was asked matter-of-factly, like Asuka didn't
realise the gravity of the situation. But she did; she was worried far more
that everyone else in that room. They wanted to live, yes. But she wanted
another to live. She couldn't stand to be safe down in the GeoFront,
while Shinji and Unit 1 were obliterated into their component atoms up on the
surface of what was left of Tokyo-3.
"I don't know how. What I do know is that if that missle detonates and
nothing stops it, more that Shinji is just going to die. Everyone in
the shelters. They can't withstand a blast of that caliber."
"I don't know what to do. I don't think Shinj's there anymore."
"What do you mean?"
"I don't know."
As the missle came closer, Unit 1 moved over to pick up the Lance.
He'd need it very soon. Just as the missle was about to it Unit 1, when it
was a few meters away from his head, something miraculous happened.
Six of the orangey-red hexagonal barriers of an AT Field appeared
around Unit 1, several dozen meters away from his body. Exept they weren't
reagular AT Fields, for these ones were angeled out slightly. Then his
vision was consumed by white fire, and he could only hope that he was
right.
The immense light caused the screens to blank for a few moments, along
with all the instruments in the room. Fortunatly, some fast-working
tech managed to cobble together some links in the electronics and restore
the screen. Just in time to see something that should never have happened.
The ball of light rapidly expanded outward, ready to continue in it's
destructive path. Then it hit the AT Fields surrounding Unti 1, and
was deflected upwards by the slight angles.
"The blast's being redirected," someone muttered. The room was silent
enough for everyone to hear it. The pillar of fire that erupted from
Unit 1's position extended for several kilometers into the sky; a spectacle
that would be remembered by all who saw it as the most horrific, and at the
same time, the most comforting sight they would ever see.
"What was that you were saying about how I needed to talk Shinji into
doing something?" Asuka asked dryly. Misato settled for staring at the
back of the younger girl's head.
"But what about Shinji?" Toji asked, finding his voice. Even he was
shocked into silence by the display of bestal fury. Someone pointed to
the screen at the pillar of fire. When it finaly died down, people could
see the extent of damage done to areas not protected by the AT Fields:
concrete was boiled away; the dirt and sand below that fused into some murky
glass; all plant life obliterated.
And standing within all was Unit 1, apparently suffering no damage at
all.
In its right hand was the Lance of Longinus. If one looked closely
enough, one would've sworn that a faint glow surrounded the red weapon.
It wasn't until Unit 1 lurched into motion that he realised just how
tired he was. It was a battle just to draw each breath; each step seemingly
impossible before he did it. He was halfway back to where he belonged
when he realised that he had one more task to accomplish.
Lifting the Lance high above his head, he waited. Then a great bolt of
lightning struck the weapon. The electrical phenomena seemed to play
along the surface of the Lance for a moment before dying away.
Then a second bolt hit, and it stuck around for a while longer.
A third bolt, and minature bolts played up and down between the twin
prongs.
A fourth and the Lance seemed to hold onto the energy, as a glow was
definatly visible around it.
A fifth and the glow intensified to the point that it hurt to look at
it.
Unit 1 held onto it for a moment before he crouched down low, paused
for a moment before springing up to his full height and throwing the Lance as
hard as possible into the air.
"Track it!" Misato yelled, but the people were already on it. Their
voices seemed to run together.
"It has escape velocity-"
"Take into accound air resistance and wind shear-"
"It still has enough velocity-"
"Breached the upper ionoshpere-"
"Has left the atmosphere-"
"The moon's gravity seems to have snagged it-"
Eventually, with all the data compiled and collated, a tech spoke up.
"The Lance has settled into Lunar Orbit."
"Ikari!"
"I know, Fuyutsuki. There's no way we can get it back now."
"Why do you think he did it." Instead of the usual answer of silence,
Fuyutsuki was surprised.
"I don't know. But I do intend to find out, and very soon."
Unit 1 was moving back to the GeoFront, and dropped down through the
same shaft as before. From there, he continued back towards the cages. He
needed rest, desperatly. His legs had buckled far more than he wanted
when he landed. It was becoming harder and harder to move.
When it's destination became clear, all three of the Eva pilots,
Misato, Kaji, Ritsuko, Maya, and Commander Fuyustuki all took the elevater to
the cages, to prepare for its arrival. They made it to the observation
rooms, which were already filled with various techs and scientists, just
before Unit 1 did. It lumbered down the massive room, towards it's berth to
rest.
The humans all stared at the giant machine as it walked by, apparenlty
not noticing any of them; soley intent on resting.
Then it stopped and turned back. It moved back towards the window and
stared into it.
Unit 1 gazed into the window, some of the people looking strangly
familar.
He moved closer, and some of the humans reacted by getting up and out
of their seats in fear. One of the people, the one on the left, really
grabbed his attention. He knew he should know that person, but he
couldn't figure it out. It's face was familar, yes; but it was the hair that
made him pause. The hair was red. Something about red and hair, and a
half-remembered revelation he had a short while ago. He decided that
he needed to investigate this further. He tried leaning closer, but
something got in his way.
The window was too small for him to see as well as he could've, and it
was rather uncomfortable to bend into that position, given the condition he
was in. He sighed and came to a decision about what to do.
Misato realised what Unit 1 was going to do before everyone else.
"Everyone! Duc-" however, she was interuppted by Unit 1's hand
crashing through the window. Everyone now leaped out of their seats and
scrambled back towards the door as fast as their legs would take them. It wasn't
until a few seconds had passed that they realised that one of their
number was missing. Then someone pointed out the now broken window and
screamed.
All heads in the room swivled around to see what the commotion was
about, and they all drew in a sharp breath when they saw Asuka being held in
the giant hand of Unit 1.
Unit 1 knew that something of importance was going on when the other
humans still inside the room starting yelling and screaming; though he
couldn't understand the words, he could hear their tones and didn't
like them. He looked down at the human in his hand, and realised that he
needed to get closer to make anything out, it was that small!
Amazingly, the human didn't flinch as he practically stuck his face in
hers. She should've, after all, he was several dozen times her size.
But she didn't. She only looked up at him defiantly, daring him to try
something, he figured. Oh, well. If that was how she wanted it...
But something made him pause. He inhaled deeply. There was a smell to
her, a scent that was vaugly familar. He breathed deeply, trying to
place it. After a few moments he decided that he would never be able to, and
that he should get on with exterminating this little creature.
Just one squeeze of his hand, and she would be reduced to a bloody
pulp.
A mass of red gore. His hand started to close, when a thought occured
to him. Red... There was something about red that he needed to
investigate.
For Misato, time seemed to slow down. It was as if she could see every
thing in perfect clarity, from the way Asuka's hair had swayed slowly
in the slight draft created by Unit 1 breathing in and out to the way Unit
1's hand tightened around her relativly small body. Her heart lept into
her chest. He was going to kill her! He really was! Acting on sudden
inspiration, she picked up the chair nearest to her and threw it out
the window at the giant form of Unit 1.
"Hey! Leave Asuka alone! Do you hear me!? Leave her alone!!" she
yelled. Soon others in the room joined in with her, throwing
everything from clipboards to more chairs and computer equipment at the
Evangelion, hoping to catch its attention before it killed Asuka.
Unit 1 simply couldn't understand what these little things were trying
to do him. They were yelling at him, and throwing some things at him. He
again didn't like their tone, but for a brief moment he thought he
could almost understand something of what they were saying. He focused his
attention on that, his task of crushing the human all but forgotten.
As soon as he diverted his attention away from the human in his had, he
again thought he could understand a word that they were saying; the rest was
a jumble. The more they said it, the more he understood it. But it was
one woman's voice yelling that him understand.
Asuka.
Looking back at the human in shock, he realized the colour of her
clothing.
Red. She was in red. His mind briefly flicked back to a short while
before, back to when he couldn't connect red with a face, but he could
to a name.
The name was hers, and so was the face.
For the first time in what seemed to be so very long, everthing made
sense. This was the person he couldn't sacrafice to beat Unit 5. This
was the girl that so important.
And with a rush of adrenaline, he realized what he was about to do her.
He couldn't believe that he was so close to crushing her. He couldn't
believe that he'd forgotten everything about her.
Finally realizing that what was in his hand was as fragile as fine
china to a being his size, he decided that he needed to put her down before
he caused her serious harm.
'Accidently or otherwise,' he reminded himself grimly. He moved his
free hand toward the window again. The humans, people, reacted with
understandable fear. But also with no small amount of anger. They
figured he was going to grab somemore people, maybe kill them all. But all he
did was push them back, creating a clear spot in the room.
He brought his other hand in behind his first and dropped Asuka off, as
gently as possible considering the sheer mass of his hand. Then he
withdrew his hands, doing his best not to hurt any more people. And
then he stared at them, waiting.
"Shinji?" Toji asked carefully, trying not get his hopes up. But when
Unit 1 nodded, though, everyone heaved a sigh of relief. But they held
their breaths when Unit 1 again extended it's hands into the room;
though this time there was no malice in the movements.
He left his hands a few meters apart, knowing what he must do. But he
had mixed feelings about it. One part of him demanded that it be followed
through, the other part wanted him to stop it. Eventually, after a
short internal battle, the former won out.
Focusing all of his energies toward his hands, he hoped it would be
enough. He hoped for Asuka's sake as well as his own.
From the humans' point of view, they could see a semi-transparent
bubble form around Unit 1's fingers, completely enclosing the space within it.
Small bolts of lightning played along the inside, though they were more
numerous where the bubble met his fingers.
Inside the bubble, a humanoid form, curled up in a ball, appeared
within it. After a few moments, the form became more distinct, and people
could discern Shinji's face and form on the body. The more time passed, the
more his body appeared to be solid. Just as soon as his body became as
solid as anyone else, it orientated to a standing position, and bubble popped
silently and he floated down to the deck. Unit 1's arms fell out of
the window and the whole Evangelion collapsed to the floor of the cages far
below.
After a few moments of tense silence, Asuka stepped forward and asked
him,
"Shinji? Are you all right?" He turned to look at her, as if he'd
never seen her before. Then it clicked in his mind, and smiled at her. His
reply was a little laboured and breathless.
"Me? Yeah, I'm fine. Goodnight," he said before his eyes rolled up
and he passed out on the floor.
end
(
geocities.com/tokyo/shrine/3281) (
geocities.com/tokyo/shrine) (
geocities.com/tokyo)