!Warning!
In this crossover the Evangelion secret stuff has been ignored in favour
of other original secret stuff. All you EVA buffs out there be warned! If
you C&C saying "but this doesn't do that" or "but that's just plain wrong!
in the OAV/COMIC/MOVIE/T.V.SHOW/C.D./SOFT DRINK that never happens /
happens differently". Then I will write back saying "so?" what I would like
is C&C on internal consistancy of _this_ fic, not how close it is to the
original source. Although characterisation mistakes should be
pointed out. Remember people, this is alternative Eva, resembling the real
thing on only the most shallow level.
!Warning!

^\_/^

Disclaimer: Neon Genesis Evangelion and Ranma 1/2 belong to different
groups of people/ companies. No disrespect intended. Please don't sue me,
I'll simply jump to an alternate dimension where money is meaningless and
people can do what they want (hey, why don't I just do that? :) ) 

		How long, my love? Introduction.

 - NERV Headquarters -

     The monitors were finally silent. This was as Misato liked it. Quiet,
the precious seconds between the times when panic and fear would fight for
control of her heart, when you could steep back and see yourself, when the
needs of that instance didn't overwhelm all other thought. This quiet
moment passed. The self control that she felt she had fought so hard for
vanished. The people in the control room around her were already jumpy
enough after what had just transpired. 
     She screamed, "WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED?" Inhale, try to find that
calm place, fail. "WHERE ARE THEY?! AND THE ANGEL??" This is it Misato, this
is when you break and they cart you off to the loonybin because you finally
lost it, she thought to herself.
     Ritsuko turned from a small computer display and faced Misato. Shock
and disbelief have etched themselves onto her face. Like an automan she
said, "The three Evas, their pilots and the Angel are no longer there.
Fementoseconds before their disapearance the deep underground gravametric
observatory, two miles beneath central dogma, registered a massive
distortion in the space-time fabric."
     "WHAT?" screeched Misato.
     Ritsuko slowly regaining some semblance of emotion, mainly fear,
said, "It's not that they're not _here_, it's that they're not here _now_."
     "Time travel?" Misato sceptically asked.
     "It would appear to be so."
     After so many strange events the crew on duty at NERV H.Q. thought
that they were a pretty unflappable lot; they were wrong. The control
centre filled with panic and people shouting. One person unaffected by the
anouncement was Gendo, sitting at his desk in Ops, he looked down on the
panicing people with pitty, THEY did not know what had happened, "But I do,"
he thought, shedding a single tear for what had happened. In the confusion
his tear went unnoticed.

{fade out}
		How long, my love? Part 1
{fade in}

     As far as Ranma was concerned you could write the events of today on
sand paper using liquid tear gas as ink, present said item to Kami-sama
and give Him very specific instructions on where to file said item.
Normally, Ranma could take the events of the day and deal with it, after all
hadn't he been travelling for ten years with his father? But today, he felt
a little blasphemy was in order for not ten minutes ago, possible the worst
event in his _whole_ life had just occured.
     The guide was speaking again, talking to him and his father. Ranma
thought it might be worth listening to, to see if the guide had found the
answer to his 'special' predicament. The guide had a book with him, it was
a very old, very large book and the guide said, "this book over ten-thousand
year old. It feature recorded history of Jusenkyo area."
     Genma, Ranma's father, gasped in amazement, "Does that book contain
information on how to get rid of our curses?!"    
     "No," the guide replied. "Is visitor's logbook, write time when you
fall in spring here, what spring called here, and what name you have
here,, and where you go to now."
     Ranma bopped the guy on the head. "Aaah! That's no use to me!!"
     "I know you want find cure so--"  
     <~~~~Ks-plooosshhh!~~~> 
     <~~~~F-fwwwoossshhhhsplishsplish!~~~>
     <~~~~Slap-slosh FOOOM!~~~~> 
     The guide turned quickly to the door to see what was happening
outside. Ranma and Genma followed him out of his house. The guide looked
around the Jusenkyo spring area.
     "It sound like three very large people fall in spring!" the guide
said in a shocked voice. "Hope it not elephant jumping in spring again. We
have trouble with stampede last year!"
     Ranma and his father really didn't want to follow the guide back to
the source of their troubles. But follow they did. They approached an area
of the cursed springs that they hadn't seen before. 
     The guide explained to them, "These are hot cursed springs, effect of
hot and cold water reversed from normal cursed spring.
     "So this kettle of hot water that I brought with me is not going to
help whoever has fallen in here," Ranma said despondantly.
     The guide replied, "No, unfortunately we need cold water to turn the
victims back into their uncursed form."
     Ranma was standing with his back against a set of particularly high
reeds, so when the kettle was snatched from his hand and he turned to see
nought but the grass reeds swaying. He backed away defensively from the
reeds and listened carefully and could hear <splash! splash!> followed by
a <f-took!> and a girl saying, "You sure took your time, Shinji." <F-took!> 
    "Whoever's in there, come out now!" Ranma challenged the kettle-thief
in the reeds. There was a moment of silence and two teenage girls in very
tight-fitting rubber and plastic suits walked out of the reeds. 
    The one who had fiery red hair and was wearing a red and black suit
shouted at Ranma, "Who the hell are you?! What is this place??!"
    The one with blue hair in the white and black suit said quietly,
"I think we would acheive a lot more without the shouting."
    Ranma was a bit stunned about the fitting that the girls clothes gave
them. From the reeds could be heard a splash and a teenage brown-haired
boy in a loose fitting white and blue suit emerged and handed the now empty
kettle to Ranma.
    The boy said plaintively, "I'm sorry about stealing your kettle but we
really needed it, er my name's Shinji Ikari, she's Rei and she's Asuka." The
boy then pressed a button the wrist of his suit where the glove connected to
the arm of the suit. <F-took!> The boy was now wearing a tight-fitting suit.
    "So you fell in the hot springs?" Ranma asked.
    Before the boy could reply, the guide cut in and said, "No. Over there
is normal cursed spring," and pointed in the direction the three young
people had come from. "Over here, where sound of large impact heard is hot
cursed spring,"  he said pointed in the direction of the hot pools of
water that were wreathed in a shawl of mist. From the direction he pointed,
something could be seen apporaching the small group, from the mist. As it
approached, what was coming could be seen with greater clarity.
For the guide, this was turning into a quite busy day. First of all,
honoured customer and son had fallen into cursed spring, there was these two
girls and a boy who'd obviously fallen into a spring. Now who was
approaching? "Anyone know of anyone else in area?!"
     Shinji tentatively announced, "Uh... Excuse me but... I think I know
what those three things are."
     Auska said something in a foreign language but the meaning was obvious.
She continued in Japanese, "My..! No!  No, this can't
be happening! I won't believe it! Not my beautiful Evangelion!!"
     Out of the mist walked a beautiful naked woman with a white swan
balanced on her left hand, with a wolf walking at her right side. The
woman walked up to Auska and put the swan on her shoulder - the
swan had a tuft of red and orange feathers on the centre of its forehead.
As the woman walked around Rei, the grey wolf, with a tuft of blue fur on
its forehead with a band of white fur sperating the blue from the grey,
stopped and stared at Rei. The beautiful woman walked up behind Shinji and
wrapped her arms protectively around him. She had black hair that flowed
down to her hips, with a streak of purple hair and a streak of green hair
running the full length of her hair.    
     The guide was used to strange things happening. Genma was feeling
a bit out of his depth and there was that big wolf. Ranma had his eyes
flicking between the girls in the suits and the naked woman behind Shinji.
Shinji was worried about his breathing due to the presence of this naked
beautiful woman. Asuka was wondering what the hell had happened to her Eva
to turn it into a SWAN!
      Rei kneeled down in front of the wolf and patted it on the head and
sang gently, "Nice doggy, good Eva..." The wolf wagged its tail.

{fade out}
		How long, my love? Part one cliffhanger
{fade in}

Shinji walked ahead of the group, it was more like marching than walking. It
was at a pace he could maintain hour after hour. Currently he had the
earphones on and was listening to the tape he always listened to, his hands
in his new-old jacket eyes focused entirely on where his next step would be.
Shinji was angry, he could not believe how insensitive Asuka was. A long
time ago someone had told Shinji that if you can't say something nice, don't
say anything at all. So he had bottled up his anger since yesterday, when
they had arrived...

.....Rei reached down and pulled the left shin guard off her suit, and then
straightened up again, holding the component in her left hand. 
     "Wacha doing?" asked Asuka, who was currently stroking the neck of the
swan that perched on her right shoulder.
     Rei lifted a flap from the inside of the guard, reveling a keypad and a
small screen. The flap was pulled off the device, a thin wire unrealed from
inside the ex-shinguard conected to the flap. Rei sat down crosslegged and
put the flap on the ground next to her, the top of the flap was covered in
corrugated concentric circles. She started to tap at the device her shin
guard had been. Quietly she replied to Asuka, "I am trying to contact NERV
using the emergency equipment integrated in our suits." Rei tapped a few
more keys on the device/ shinpad.
     Asuka was slightly chagrined, so she dismissed it as not worthy of her
talents.
    From out of the Guides house walked Shinji and the mystery woman, who
was now clothed in one of Ranma's red Chinese shirts and a pair of white
karate trousers. She was wearing Japanese sandals on her feet. Shinji came
over to where Rei and Asuka were sitting with Genma, who was currently panda
shaped. 
     Shinji looked at what Rei doing and said, "The emergency equipment.
Good idea, Rei." Asuka merely growled for a moment. 
     Rei looked up from what she was doing and said in a more expressionless
manner than usual, "I am unable to contact the UN satellites. I am also
unable to contact any public access communication satellites."
     Asuka decided to express her opinion. "Ha! Can't you do anything, Rei?
You're useless!" 
    Rei did not respond to Asuka's insult, she tapped at the device for a
few moments before she said in her usual tone, "I have been able to pick up
a G.P.S. feed. According to the satellite clocks, it is the 16th May."
     "Rei, that is so obviously wrong! It is November for one thing!" Asuka
interrupted.
      Rei continued to speak, "16th May, 1999."
      "WHAT?!" shouted Asuka.
      "Uh, Rei, I think you might have an equipment malfunction," said
Shinji as gently as possible.
       Genma-panda got up and headed for the guide's house.
      Asuka pulled her left shin guard from her suit and set it up.
"Obviuosly the _defective_ equipment was given to the _defective_ pilot,"
she saracastically said. For a few moments there was quiet as Asuka set up
her own communication gear.
     During this time Shinji said, "I think it's best that my Eva in its
female cursed mode should have a name. And I was thinking maybe- "
     "-Perhaps she should choose her own name instead of whatever dumb name
you've picked," quipped Asuka. Before Shinji could reply, Asuka frowned and
tapped at a few more keys. "Oh, man, my equipment must have the same defect
as Rei's! I can't find any UN satellites at all!" She smiled incredulously.
"This thing is _so_ broken! It's saying that we're in the middle of China...
This place looks nothing at all like China!!" She pointed to pristine
snow-capped mountains in the distance and then lowered her hand to point at
the idyllic tree-filled valley. "Where's the devastation? China is a barren
hellhole! No people could live there."
     Genma (human) and Ranma came over to the three teenagers, from the hut.
     "Are those devices saying it's May of '99?" Genma asked.
     "Uh, yes," said Shinji.
     Genma turned to Ranma and said, "Ranma, we've come to the end of our
trip. We _must_ turn to Japan as quickly as we can."
     "But why? We've been travelling for ten years?" Ranma asked. "What's so
special?"
     "I have told you of my friend Soun Tendo, I promised him that I would
return to Japan before June '99."
     "We're cuttin' off our trip here because you wanna go meet one of your
friends?!" Ranma's eyes narrowed as he continued, "You ain't got no ulterior
motive, have you?" 
     Genma sweat-dropped and replied, "N-no! Whatever would make you think
that?"
     "Experience," Ranma quipped...

...Shinji's feet were beginning to hurt him. He looked up from where he was
walking and saaw thhat he'd entered a village of some sort. All the people
were gathered in the main square and some sort of competition was going on.
He sat down at the table, away from the crowd and picked up an apple and bit
into it. A few minutes later his tape ran out and begun to auto-rewind. This
broke his concentration and he looked up to see a beautiful, young Chinese
woman with long purple hair, wearing an ornamental fighting suit of some
sort. She was holding a pole with a large sphere at one end and had just
said something. 
    "I'm sorry, I didn't catch what you said," answered Shinji
apologetically. The young woman brought the pole back and swung it at his
head. 

{Fade out.}

Well that's it for part 1! The more observant amongst you will have noticed
the Ranma timeline has been shoved forward a lot. A sixteen-year old Ranma
in 1999 is not Ranma-canon. Neither is what I'm doing with the Evangelion
compenent of the story - this is deliberate. This is Alternative. 

Easy C&C - the choice fo the new generation. Just cut and paste for your
ideal message.

1) Stop the story, it's no good!
2) Reasonable story.
3) Good! I will be looking for more of this!
4) Exceptional!!
5) The story should have a strong Ranma bias/ style.
6) The story should have a strong Eva bias/ style. 
7) Send me part 2 when it's done or I will kill you! ;)
8) Send me part 2 when it's done and I will kill you! :(
9) You're better at script-writing.
10) You should permenantly change to prose.

PHOOsun.

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" You know, I really should get a quote for the .sig file..."
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