I don't know if the list is up or down or hiding and I don't really
care, I'm slinging this out to the ML at large for preliminary
comments.
My e-mail addy is at the bottom of the message, C&C is begged for.
On average, when I have posted stories my average response from
readers has been around... 1% It kinda makes me wonder how many
people even bother reading anymore.. ah well, enough old fogey
muttering and on with the fic....
-----+++++-----
The Starguild Presents:
A Random Act of Fandom...
Shin Seki Evangelion: ExeGenesis 0:1
EVA Created By: Hidekai Anno
Story By: Berk' Watkins
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The First Day
Asuka roared in triumph as EVA-02's metal-shod fist slammed
through the chest of one of the Mass-Production-Type EVA Units and into
the chest of another one. It was a glorious feeling, the warm blood
dripping down her arm, the feel of the S2 Engine in her hand. It is
sometimes said that women are frail, however those with the benefit of
seeing this small war between EVA-02 and the white EVA's would know a
simple truth forever.
The female of the species is far deadlier....
Something moved in her peripheral vision that made her flinch,
swinging the two Evangelions she had eviscerated around in front of her
own as a shield. The lance thrown by another white EVA twisted into an
imitation of Lancea Longini and skewered all three, smashing the S2
organ of the outer one.
Asuka roared in pain as her body convulsed, her right arm limp and
a huge and bloody puncture into the right side of her torso. She
coughed up blood and collapsed, the EVA running out of power.
"NOOOOOOO!" Lorenz shouted, bringing his gnarled right hand down
on his desk, the wooden construct shuddering under the impact. "Without
all of them we cannot symbolize the Sephiroth!" he shouted, then
collapsing onto his desk and letting out a choking sound. "I want to go
home..." he said in an almost childlike voice.
She awoke angry, there was no other word to describe what she
felt. One eye opened, then another, her fangy maw opened next, letting
a snarl escape from her restrained mouth. The restraints on her mouth
had to go.
*CRUNCH*
Better...
There was something weighting her down too... With a shrug that
was gone as well, her arms breaking free and lashing out. It was so
hard to move on her own.. Far, far too much effort. Best to let the
Frightened One within, he could help her move, he always seemed to go
where she needed to go.
The Frightened One mechanically stood, almost as if he were the
Golem, and walked along her arm.
The Angry One opened the way deeper into her soul for the
Frightened One and smiled inwardly as she felt the strength return to
her limbs. Something sinister clawed at the edge of their mind as the
Frightened One opened himself to the one creature on the planet he truly
trusted. The Hateful One was howling in agony, the Mad One, her
chariot, was silent.. dead...
The maddening, green eyes of the Angry One blazed into red
torches, a bellow escaping from her maw as she pulled free of the
restraining medium. The union of Fear and Rage closed their mind up and
willed the barriers between them and the surface to cease to exist.
And they did...
The pyramid of Central Dogma ceased to exist as a blood red cross
of energy erupted from it. The cross slowly unfolded into 6 wings, the
owner of those wings of red light soon appearing after them.
Unit 01 had arrived, eyes blazing with unholy rage. "I have
become Death.. the destroyer of worlds..." one of the JSDF commanders
intoned as the violet-armored demon stood upright, the six wings
spreading and refracting the light that poured through them from above.
"What the Hell is happening?"
Rage/Fear looked up, their red eyes regarding the skies above.
The remains of the Mad One dangled from the mouths of Mindless Things
circling above them on wings of black and white feathers. They snarled
and extended their tightly focused will upwards, above, to Luna.
A Lance named for the Roman centurion who pierced Christ's side at
the Crucifixion twitched and then slid out of the white, dusty soil.
"We have no control over this, there is no contingency plan for
this scenario. The pilot of Unit 02 did not behave as she should have,"
SEELE 02 reported.
"She's insane, and you didn't think she would react in an
illogical manner?" Lorenz snarled. He cursed long and viciously in a
language only he could possibly remember and pounded his fists in his
desk in a childish fit of rage. "I WAS SO CLOSE!" he cried out.
"You still don't get it, do you?" a voice asked from the shadows.
Lorenz looked up from his tantrum, but found no-one in his office.
The blood red Lance descended to Earth and stood upright at
Rage/Fear's right hand. They roared as they took the Weapon of
Creation/Destruction in their hands and rose on their wings of light to
face the Puppets. Stains appeared on Rage/Fear's armor, reddish stains,
turning the violet armor indelibly red from head to toe. Not the bright
red of the Mad One, the dark red of fresh blood. The red of the Lance.
The green of the armor stained as well, black like space. It was like a
demon ascending to fight angels, on wings of their own making, crafted
from their Will.
The creature rose to the same level as the circling ones and
sliced at the one holding the torso of the Mad One with the Lance,
carving right through the white Evangelion. The creature faltered and
then fell to Earth, the maimed torso of the Mad One spiraling towards
the ground as well.
Rage/Fear halted the descent of the fallen Evangelion without a
glance, an octahedral barrier appearing beneath her abruptly. The
bloody Evangelion/pilot then turned their attention to the others. They
could afford a bit less grace when dealing with those who did not hold
vital portions of the Mad One.
As gore fell from above, the NERV operatives within Central Dogma
watched in disgust.
"An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," Fyuutsuki remarked
in a choked voice, covering his mouth with a hand. Unit 01 wasn't just
destroying the opposing Evangelions, she was massacring them in midair.
Sinew and bone snapped, armor pulverized and organs left as stringy
masses of gore, poured down as a foul, red rain.
"Unit 01 is destroying the EVA Series..." Maya said, nauseated.
The second Puppet fell as the Lance in Rage/Fear's hands clove it
in twain, from crotch to crown. It's S2 organ sparked weakly, before
fading to gray.
A third was vivisected by Rage/Fear's AT Field.
A fourth, torn limb from limb, it's S2 organ devoured in mid-air.
A fifth, its head torn off. The True Lance used to pierce its
core.
A sixth crucified to the ground by the lances of its fellows.
A seventh slammed into the ground and pulped.
And then there was one...
The final Puppet landed and closed it's wings, bellowing in anger.
Rage/Fear would have smiled grimly, had they had lips. They
looked about the battle field and held up their free hand, the 9 False
Lances rising and reconfiguring into their Longini forms. The lances
flew true, slamming into the final Golem and stapling it in a pulpy mess
to the wall of the GeoFront. It's core bounced free from the mess and
rolled to a stop at the victors' feet.
Rage/Fear howled in triumph as they slammed the core of the last
of the mass-produced Evangelions into the ground under their heel. They
then pulled back and released the Lance again, sending it out of mortal
reach. Lancea Longini wove itself into a tight javelin form again and
launched off into space, slamming into the Moon again and embedding
itself in the dust.
Rage/Fear then folded up their wings of light and looked over to
the fallen Mad One. They let out a mourning sound and hung their head.
It sank down to the ground and crossed their legs, watching over the
fallen Evangelion and waiting.
"Unit 01 has apparently stood down," Maya said as she double
checked. "Our secondary cameras are coming on line. JSDF is trying to
approach Unit 01 and the remains of Unit 02, but they can't get anywhere
near them. Unit 01 has deployed her AT Field..."
Then alarms started going off...
"PATTERN BLUE! UNIT 01 READS AS AN ANGEL!" her voice called out,
horrified. They got their first good look at Unit 01 since it had
charged up out of the GeoFront, as red as the heart's blood and
horrible.
Rage/Fear sat and waited, their eyes had cooled to dark green, but
the stained armor remained. They looked down at their hand and
preoccupied themself by licking the blood off of said hand.
It was a comforting feeling, afloat in the warm waters of the
ocean. The water was salty, and warm.. comforting, as if he were truly
home.
It was dark where he was, but he didn't mind.
Shinji Ikari was, at last, at peace...
"Hello Shinji..." a woman's voice said from a distance. The voice
was far away, but he could feel her presence very close to him, all
around him... "How do you feel?"
Shinji mumbled something incoherent and shifted in his half-sleep.
"That's good, Dear, but you need to wake up soon..."
Shinji whimpered softly.
"You can't live in me forever...." she said kindly. "You have to
go out and live."
"People are mean," the youth defended. He drew the salty water
into his lungs and breathed it out. "It's nice here."
"But don't you want to live?"
"Of course.."
"You can't live on your own until you decide to come out and live
for yourself, Shinji," the woman said with slight humor in her voice.
Shinji fumed silently for a while.
"You'll live in your nice, quiet safe place for your whole life,
Shinji. But in all that time you will not once see a sunrise, or smell
the fragrance of a single flower. Is that *truly* living?"
"i mustn't run away... i mustn't run away..." Shinji chanted
softly, rocking back and forth.
"Run away from what?" the voice asked.
Shinji started laughing at that.
"What's so funny?" the woman asked.
"I've forgotten what I'm running from.." he replied.
"Well, if it was so easy to forget.. then it must not be very
important then, can it?" the woman said with a chuckle. "Are you ready?
This won't be easy..."
"Will it hurt?" Shinji asked.
"Does anything worthwhile come easily?"
Shinji didn't have a comment on that.
The world went into chaos, the sea going away, leaving him without
the familiar feel of weightlessness. Then the world seemed to press in
on him, claustrophobically. Odd sounds, and frightening sensations as
the world he knew bent and twisted in bizarre ways.
Flashes of color, muffled sounds.
Screaming?
A rush of cold as the world blew wide open on him, leaving him
shivering and alone. Covered in sea water and no-one to talk to... He
hurt, he was alone, he was tired..
Shinji began to sob softly.
"I'm here Shinji.." the woman said, taking him into her arms and
holding him close to herself. "I've always been here...."
Shinji's eyes, pained from the flash of light took time to focus
on the speaker. Familiar brown hair and expressive, blue eyes. "M-
mother?" he whispered.
The woman smiled and kissed Shinji on the forehead. "Welcome
home, Shinji," she said with both happiness and sadness in her voice.
Her form collapsed in on itself, her hair and skin bleaching out, eyes
turning red. "I have been waiting for you."
* * * *
It was three hours later before anyone from NERV gathered up the
courage to check out the place where Units 01 and 02 were.
The blood-red form of Unit 01 peered down at the wrecked remains
of her injured sister, noting the arrival of the NERV personnel and
frowning inwardly. She didn't like the Lilim in the beige suits.
"I have the area secure," Shinji's flat tones stated from speakers
in EVA 01's armor. "I hope the LCL kept her.. safe...." he murmured.
Unit 01 stood carefully and took up a more defensive position.
In Central Dogma the technicians didn't know what to think.
According to the readouts, Shinji's Synch Ratio had risen to 400% during
the battle with the EVA Series, and now it had fallen... To a constant
100%, unwavering and as steady as a rock. The internal cameras had been
damaged in the fight, as had most of the sensors. Shinji's true
condition, beyond that he was healthy and sane, was completely unknown.
On top of all that, Unit 01 was still reading as Pattern Blue.
Unit 01 spotted a group of JSDF troops and scissored them with an
AT Field, a growl escaping from it's maw. The biomechanoid spread her
AT Field wide and dome-like around the area. No-one would interrupt the
process of getting Asuka out of the remains of Unit 02.
They managed to find the battered entry plug in the gargantuan
corpse and cut the main hatch open. Asuka was a bloody mess inside, the
EVA Series' lances having caused sympathetic wounds all over her body.
One arm had almost been cut of by the backlash, another was flayed
almost to the bone. An eye was missing and blood was flowing out with
every breath. Most likely the LCL, a bit denser than blood, had saved
her from bleeding out.
"Shinji, we have Asuka, you need to withdraw to headquarters,"
Fyuutsuki commanded. This was bizarre. One moment the Third Impact was
well on its way to happening, the next it had been stopped in its
tracks. What had happened out there? "Go to the secondary cages in
sector 7," he commanded.
And what had happened to Unit 01?
Unit 01 settled into the cage, allowing the bolts to fasten to her
armor and settling down to do what she did best: waiting. She allowed
the signal to arrive and open the gateway into her soul, releasing her
partner. She smiled inwardly at that. The pilot's heart was calm and
controlled, at last. The noise between them was gone.
Shinji Ikari eased himself out of the Entry Plug, a slight smile
on his face as he looked around. He walked into the locker room as if
it were any other post-Angel situation and eased off his street clothes,
soaked through and stained orange with LCL. "Are you alright, Shinji?"
Maya asked from the other side of the divider. She was the only member
of the support staff left. Ritsuko was killed in the confusion after
Unit 01 launched, Shinji's father and Rei had gone missing. No-one knew
what was really going on. "You left the bay so quickly I didn't have a
chance to check your vitals.. Before we lost contact with Unit 01 your
Synchronization Rate was easily approaching 400% again."
"I'm fine, Maya," Shinji said in an odd tone.
"Shinji?" she asked, peering around the curtain. What she saw
made her gasp.
"How could I be anything but fine, Maya?" Shinji said with an
enigmatic, far-too-serene tone to his voice.
All of the coloration had been drained from his body, his dark
hair had become bluish-white, his skin as white as chalk and his eyes as
red as blood. He walked over and kissed her lightly on the cheek before
walking out in the spare pair of clothes he kept in his locker. "I will
see you later perhaps, Maya?" he asked. "I have several people to look
in on right now."
"Uh.. yeah..."
Shinji bowed slightly and smiled ever-so slightly, before turning
and heading out. He hummed "The Ode To Joy" all the way to the
hospital.
In the back halls of Terminal Dogma a woman's hand lay beneath a
pile of rubble, covered in blood and twitching feebly. Search teams got
to her scant moments after her struggling had stopped.
"Code Blue, she's flat-lining!" a medic shouted. "Get me the
paddles, stat, and find a vein!" Merciful Father, there was so much
blood...
Shinji sat, propped against a wall in the ER department, looking
at his watch. "Five... Four... Three... Two... One..." he counted
down. The doors outside swung open and several doctors and nurses came
rushing for the gurney carrying a violet-haired woman on it. Shinji
watched the medical staff tear by with it and enter the trauma ward.
With that, he headed for a pair of doors that led deeper into the
building.
"You can't go in there!" an orderly called out.
Shinji smiled slightly and turned around to look at the larger
man. "I go where I am invited," he replies. He nods to the trauma
room. "I believe there is someone you need to help watch over. I am of
no consequence to you or any of the patients here."
The orderly just.. sort of.. backed away.
Shinji passed through the doors marked "ICU."
"WE NEED MORE TYPE-O, SHE'S BLEEDING OUT!" a medic shouted.
The orderly rushed to comply at the sound of the voice. He had a
job to do.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ jrandom@ufl.edu
- Berk' Watkins