$Author: Graffiti $
$Date: 1996/09/21 02:20:51 $
$Id: Shadow.Music,v 1.5 1996/09/21 02:20:51 Graffiti Exp $
$RCSfile: Shadow.Music,v $
$Revision: 1.5 $
$State: Exp $

I posted this 'fic a few days ago, but I was half-asleep, so I'm not sure
I did it right.  Not to mention my isp's mail router is less than adequate
so I don't even know if it reached the ml.  So I'm posting this again,
along with a few corrections/additions.  This is part one of this 'fic.
I'll have the rest of it ready when I find the time to write it.  C&C/Flames
welcome.

Legal stuff: Bubble Gum Crash and Neon Genesis Evangelion are Copyrighted
by their respective owners, whoever they are.  Shadow Music is Copyrighted
by me.

BEGIN:

Shadow Music: A Bubble Bug Crash/Neon Genesis Evangelion X-over fanfic

The red haze slowly faded from Priss' eyes.  The echo of water dripping
in the distance brought her about.

"Priss, are you okay?"

The faint, flickering neon light hammered at her eyes.  A dull ache was
rising in her head.  Focusing on the voice, Priss tried to identify who
it was.

"Linna?"

She looked up into the worried eyes of her friend, holding her in her arms.
There was an ugly gash down the right side of her neck, and she looked like
she bathed in blood.  There were cuts and burns all over her.  Why did she
look like that?

"Oh Priss... I was so worried..."

Linna's eyes filled with tears as she laid her head on Priss's shoulder,
her tears beginning to dry as her breathing ceased.

"Oooo...", Priss groaned.  "Linna, get off.  You're lying on a bruise."

There was no response.  Priss pushed her friend off and shook her.

"Linna, wake up.  I said, wake up!  Hey!"

Then she noticed that her friend wasn't breathing anymore.

"This isn't funny, Linna."

Priss shook her friend, trying to wake her.

"Linna?  Linna?  Linna!"

Then it all came back to her.  The destruction of MegaTokyo by the Angel.  
Their last, desperate stand against the enemy.  The uneasy alliance with
Genom.  Their defeat...

A ragged sob escaped Priss' lips as she cradled her friend's lifeless body.

"Linna!  No... not you too!"

Her cries echoed into the darkness of the uncaring night.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

"Test Sequence One complete.  Systems status, Fifty-nine percent."

Dr. Akagi sighed and dropped into her chair.  Grabbing a nearby cup of
coffee, she drank deeply.  Or tried to.

"PPPBBTTHHHBT!  Ugh!  Gah!  Who made this?!"

Misato looked at her flatly.

"I did.  You got a problem with that?"

Putting the cup down, she shook her head.

"Never-mind.  My fault.  I should have asked before I took a sip."

Misato sniffed indignantly and spun about... and the System caught her eye.

"Will this work?", she asked softly.  "In all this time, we've never used
_this_ in actual combat.  And our main pilot is... well, less than stable."

Ritsuko looked at her friend.  She saw the deep lines of doubt marring
her face.  The face of a warrior who knows that she is useless in the
field of battle.  The face of a warrior who sees death, and can't do
anything about it.

"I don't know.  But do we really have any choice?  Our former pilots left
when they found out the Truth.  I don't think they'll ever come back.  No
matter what happens to the world.  And while we're talking about pilots,
shouldn't you have more confidence in her?  After all, she's the only
family you have left."

Misato looked through the armored glass window.  Her reflection was crawling
out of the System.  Her twin sister, being helped by their younger sister.
Until last week, she didn't know she had any siblings, much less a twin.

"Damn adulterous womanizing son of a bitch," Misato muttered, thinking of her
father.  "I knew that he was a worthless, cheating, ...."

Her twin, Sachiko, waved at her.  "Hey Misato!  I did it!  I finally synched
with the System!"

Misato winked back at her and gave her a thumbs up.  But her younger sister,
Priss, just walked away; eyes on the ground, shoulder slumped, her feet
dragging on the ground.

Sachiko looked toward Priss as well.  She gave one final wave to her Misato,
and trotted after her little sister to cheer her up.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

"Priss!  Wait up!"

Priss glanced over her shoulder and saw Sachiko jogging toward her.
Slowing her pace, she watched as her new partner caught up.

"Priss, why the long face?  We did it!  We finally synched with the
system today!"

Sachiko's face beamed with joy, her eyes looking into Priss' with a
glowing light.

"Oh... nothing," Priss said.  "I guess I'm just a little tired. I'll just
get some sleep and catch you later, OK?"

Sachiko smiled, and gave her sister a hug.  "Don't worry Priss.  Soon,
this will all be over and you can go back to singing," Sachiko said.  Then
she winked.  "Hey, I'll get free tickets, right?"

A forced smile seemed to re-assure Sachiko.  "Sure.  You'll get a free
ticket to my concerts.  And backstage passes too."

Clapping her sister on the shoulder, Sachiko smiled and ran off to the
locker room to change.  "I'll see you later!", she called over her
shoulder.  "Gotta run!  I got a date in half an hour!"

As Sachiko's footfalls faded away, Priss leaned against the wall, closed her
eyes, and sighed.  Just above her, a loudspeaker crackled to life.

"Pilot 01, report to the ICU ward immediately."

Priss' eyes popped open, and she breathed a single word: "Linna!"

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

*SLAM!*

Startled, Linna jumped in her bed, and promptly doubled over in pain as that
pulled at her stitches.

"Linna!  You're alive!"

Giving her friend an annoyed look, Linna sat up straight and tried not to
glower.

"Of course I'm alive!  Did you think I'd be in a hospital if I were dead?"

"Uh... but..."

"No buts.", Linna said.  "I'm alive.  Now, where is everybody?  And why am
I in a hospital?  And why is that picture of me next to my bed in black and
white, and wrapped in a black ribbon?"
Then she blinked, seeing the skin-tight suit Priss was wearing.  A very *wet*
and *thin* skin-tight suit.  "And _what_ is that... *thing* you're wearing?!",
she gasped.

Priss, trying to recover from Linna's onslaught, started to giggle.
"It's good to see you too, Linna."
She ran over the questions in her mind, and her face fell.
"Linna... that picture next to your bed is like that because you _were_
dead."

Linna blinked.  "Huh?"

"You see, the people here found me shortly after our battle with the Apostle.
They were able to revive you.  And... everyone's dead except for us.  They..."
Priss faltered.  "They didn't make it."

The memories of her final hours slammed back into Linna's mind.  She put her
hands to her mouth, eyes wide, as she recalled every nightmarish detail of
that fight.  By the time she realized that Priss was sitting next to her, she
was crying in her arms.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

A crow settled on the ground in front of her.  It was just an ordinary crow,
really.  A perfectly ordinary, black, beady-eyed, ugly bird.  Just like
Eno-kun.  In fact, if her hook dress didn't keep her from running, she would
have rushed up to the bird on stomped on it.  Just like she would on Eno-kun.
If he ever arrived.

The park clock struck midnight.  Sighing, Sachiko got up and slung her purse
over her shoulder.  This was just an ordinary night.  Strap-less hook dress,
crimson lipstick, killer high-heels, and a date that didn't show.

"I'm starting to become just like Misato," she muttered.  A dejected sigh
escaped her lips.  "Well, at least Misato's dates show up every once in a
while."

High heels clicking on the stone walk, Sachiko started to walk home after being
stood up again.  And waiting for four hours.

The crow gazed at her back, silent, unmoving.  Amused.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

Blinking lights and soft, high-pitched hums from electronic equipments shook
the placid air.  A burnt, twisted mass of metal and flesh sat before a glowing
terminal, its fingers dancing above the keyboard.  Two corpses behind her
were lying on metallic slabs, uncovered.

Several robotic arms with various surgical implements at their ends descended
from the ceiling.  The ear-shattering whine of metal on bone filled the room.
Lurching to its feet, the creature hobbled across the room to a section of the
wall covered with a meaningless jumble of numbers.  Pressing one, the creature
waited patiently as the wall section rose into the ceiling, revealing a chamber
filled with large cylinders of green liquid.

Three of the cylinders were bubbling, lit from within.  The creature dragged
itself toward the closest of the three, and a pair of robotic arms descended
from the ceiling to raise her and lower her into the liquid.
Two wide, oval disks of white seemed to lose their shine, and the flesh slowly
floated off of creature's mechanical frame.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

Calmly sipping her coffee, Misato looked over Priss' records.  It wasn't easy,
considering she wasn't supposed to have access to genetic information.  That
was why she was hiding in the broom closet.  And sipping her coffee.

"No records of her prior to our discovery?"

Misato frowned.  In this age of information and computerization, there should
have been _some_ kind of data on her "sister".  She continued reading.

"Genetic analysis of subject shows with conclusive evidence that she is related
to Chief Tactical Officer Misato (what was her last name? -- Graffiti).  It is
the opinion of this doctor, therefore ...."

"Doctor my ass," Misato muttered.  "He can't even tell the difference between a
cold and a plague."

The image of the young Dr. Flight running from the examination room, screaming
of a plague, brought a giggle to her lips.  That was one of her best jokes yet.
With a smirk on her face, she continued to read through the rest of the report.

"Having fun?"

Startled, Misato fumbled the report, trying to hide it, and spilled steaming
coffee all over her shirt.

"EEEEEEOOOOWWW!"

Ritsuko stared at her friend coldly, and snatched the report out of her hands.

"If you don't mind, these records are confidential," she snapped.  "If you want
to take a peek, make a formal request.  If this ever happens again..."

"My shirt!", Misato wailed.  "This was my favorite one!  Oh, what's that? Umm...
OK.  It'll never happen again.  I promise."

Grinning like an imp, Misato sauntered out of the broom closet nonchalantly...
and tripped on a bucket, landing flat on her face.

Ritsuko helped her friend up.  "Now, why in the world were you looking at this?
What's in there that you can't just ask her?  She *is* your sister, after all."

"Sister," Misato sighed.  "Well, the `genetic analysis' says she's my sister.
But there's no record of her anywhere.  At least Sachiko has records indicating
she was raised in an orphanage, and all.

"But Priss...," Misato trailed off.  "She's a complete blank.  I can't find a
single medical, dental, school, police, or hospital record on her.  Hell, I
can't even find a birth certificate!"

A smile crossed Dr. Akagi's face.  "Well, you know that much of our records
were destroyed in the previous battles.  Maybe you can't find anything on her
because they were all destroyed.  Don't think too much of it.  It's no big
deal."

Misato gave her Ritsuko a flat stare.  "No big deal?  Remember that Apostle
Seele sent?  We couldn't find any real records on him, either.  No big deal?
He nearly destroyed us!"

Forcing a concerned frown from her face, Ritsuko led her friend out of the
room.  "As I said, don't worry about it.  We've stepped up our biological
scans of all employees, so there's no chance of anything getting past us
again."

As the door closed on the room, a darkness settled in.  The aroma of coffee
was stifled by something colder, something sinister.  A green and mottled hand
grasped Priss' data file...

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

End Part 1.
Graffiti