Subject: [FFML] [Fanfic][[Ranma/Neon Genesis Xover] A Couple of Angels, chapter 3
From: Corwin
Date: 8/14/2000, 5:35 PM
To: FFML

As always, C&C would be greatly appreciated.

Disclaimer time:
Rumiko Takahashi, Shogagukan, Kitty and Viz Communications own Ranma
1/2. Hideaki Anno, Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, Gainax and ADV Films own Neon
Genesis Evangelion.

I'd like to thank my pre-readers for this chapter:

Dave Menard <deibu_kun@sympatico.ca>
James Merritt <delta@qx.net>
Jourdan Bickham <jmbickham@hotmail.com>
Thomas Hackwood <thackwood@mindspring.com>
"JJang13977@aol.com" <JJang13977@aol.com>

Corwin (ely7@inter.net.il or corwin@virtuallyjeannie.com)
http://lavender.fortunecity.com/friday/573/anime.html

-- Attached file included as plaintext by Listar --
-- File: acoa-ch3-draft2.txt

A Couple of Angels

Chapter 3

"Say, Rei... since I'm going to be earning money now an' all, could you
do me a favor?" Ranma asked, shuffling her feet uncomfortably.

Blinking once, Rei asked, "What is it?"

"Well, you see... my only pair of clothes got ruined..."

Without saying a word, Rei walked over to her closet and pullet out a
school uniform, handing it to Ranma, who immediately started making
warding gestures.

"Ack! I didn't mean it like that! Y'know I'm really a guy, an' we just
don't wear dresses!"

Pausing in her steps, Rei cocked her head and waited for the flustered
girl to explain herself.

"What I meant was... could you loan me some money for a new Chinese
outfit? I'll pay you back with my first paycheck, I promise!"

"Is this one of the things friends do?" Rei asked.

"Ye... no, Rei. Actually, it's better never to loan any money to
friends," Ranma answered, hanging her head. "But I'm asking you anyway."

Not hearing a reply from the blue haired girl, she started saying "Go
ahead, say no, I don't min..." before being cut off by Rei.

"Here," she said in her soft monotone, handing Ranma a wad of bills.
They weren't much, but should suffice for a shirt and a pair of pants.

"Thanks, Rei," Ranma said, her eyes sparkling with emotion. Sudden
inspiration caused the next question to leave her mouth before the
pigtailed girl could think about it.

"Hey, would you like to come an' help me choose an outfit? Maybe we can
go and grab a bite to eat afterwards, or somethin'."

Going over her offer, Ranma mentally groaned and berated herself. 'Just
great! Now she'd think I'm asking her out on a date!'

Considering the offer for a few moments, Rei agreed with a silent nod,
deciding she'd like to spend some time with her friend.

* * *

"Hey, Ikari, you lucky dog!" Toji roared, approaching Shinji with
Kensuke in tow.

"Um, what brought this on?" the young pilot of Unit 01 asked
uncertainly.

"Da ladies, what else? Not only Rei's actually talked ta ya for no
reason today, but Ranko seems ta like you too!" Toji elaborated,
slapping his friend on the back a few times.

Shinji's face paled, as he imagined what Ranko probably liked to do to
him, especially after that stupid slip of his the day before.
Shuddering, he quelled the rather graphic images that his mind was happy
to provide for him, and tried his best to ignore his friends from that
point on.

"What's the matter, Ikari?" Toji reacted to the expression on his face.
"Don't know who to choose?"

"Date them both," Kensuke helpfully supplied, before adding with stars
in his eyes. "Rei's so... mysterious, and Ranko's just dreamy."

'If Ranko hears any of this, I'm _so_ dead...' Shinji thought
dejectedly. It was unfair, really. How was he supposed to know she was
one of _those_ girls? He thought mentioning that instance to his
friends, but immediately reconsidered it, as he wasn't sure how the
unstable girl would react to that. A particular nasty image returned
full force, and Shinji suddenly felt a compelling urge to clutch his
groin.

This didn't go unnoticed by his pair of friends. As they were about to
ask him what was wrong, the answer revealed itself in the form of a
beautiful red-head a few meters away from them. She was playing a game
of 'UFO Catcher', and the effort she was putting into it made her
already short dress flutter uncontrollably. Smoke pouring out of their
noses, Toji and Kensuke knelt down to catch a brief glimpse of heaven,
as Shinji was too shocked to move from his previous position.

Cursing loudly in what appeared to be German, the girl spin-kicked the
machine after losing, and turned around in anger only to find the trio
of boys in their compromising positions.

As she began approaching them with murder in her eyes, Toji straightened
up to stand next to Shinji, while Kensuke got on all fours and exclaimed
"Spank me, Baby!" dreamily. His friends looked at him strangely, while
the girl appeared to be utterly disgusted.

Coming to stand in front of the boys, she snorted disdainfully at them
and reached out her hand, demanding, "Gimme 100 yen."

Ignoring Kensuke's comment, which strangely sounded like 'shagadelic',
Toji asked brightly, "Huh? 100 yen?"

"I'm out of tokens," the girl said, gesturing at the game machine. "It's
not too much - 100 each."

Collecting a 100 yen bill from Kensuke, who now was kneeling not unlike
a puppy, staring at the red-head's... face, she turned to look at Toji
and Shinji, saying "Well?" impatiently.

Shinji, having retrieved some of his spine, if not his wits, asked her,
" Why do we have to pay you anyway?"

"It's a peeping fee for taking liberties with me," the girl replied.

"What liberties?" Shinji asked. "I haven't done any..."

At that point Shinji realized where his hand had been for the entire
time. Quickly scrambling to come up with an answer, he stammered, "No,
no, no! It wasn't because of you. I was thinking of another red-head..."

"Do tell," a chilling voice cut his lame attempts at an excuse.

At the sound of that voice Shinji's face went completely white, as his
worst nightmares came to life to haunt him all at once. 'No, it couldn't
be... Please, God, anyone but her...'

Ranma repeated her question, letting more irritation enter her voice
this time. For some reason, the girls' section was the only place where
Chinese clothes of her size still remained, and she felt like a pervert
every second she was forced to stay there. Inevitably being to large
quantities of girls' lingerie, when an errant bit of hot water would
revert her back to a guy got on her nerves a lot as well. And as if it
hadn't been bad enough, some pervert tried to walk in on her at the
dressing room while she was changing. Now, that a new set of her
favorite outfit finally adorned her form, she was trying to forget that
horrid ordeal, when she had to run into that... boy.

Shinji felt righteous female fury about to be unleashed upon him, and
fell on his knees, reinventing the powerful Crouching Tiger technique.

"Oh, please, please don't kill me!"

There was so much more that he wanted to say, like 'I didn't mean it',
'I'll do anything' and 'I'm too young to die', but nothing coherent
seemed to come out after his first statement, so he settled for
groveling at the red-head's feet.

"Why is Ikari-kun behaving like that?" Rei asked no one in particular.
She'd been standing by Ranma, trying to understand what was going on,
but no explanation presented itself.

"It's just his survival instincts at work, Rei," Ranma replied, as she
became irritated with the scene they were all causing. Seeing the blue
haired girl blink in confusion, otherwise retaining a straight face,
Ranma elaborated, "He knows he's going to die."

As Shinji's sobs intensified in volume, increasing Ranma's irritation
further, Rei commented, "Ikari-kun is my friend. I do not wish for him
to die."

Ranma mused over Rei's words, coming to the conclusion that she was
right. Shinji was probably her only other friend, and killing him for
his perverted ways would do more harm than good. Besides, he didn't have
much of a spine to back up his perversions, anyway.

Grabbing the boy's arm, Ranma drew him to his full height. Slapping him
a couple of times to catch his attention, she sighed.

"Relax, I ain't gonna kill ya... now. Since you're Rei's friend an' all,
I'll cut you some slack this time." Bringing Shinji's face closer to
hers, until they were mere inches apart, Ranma warned him, "But if ya
ever try anything at me or her, you'll be in a whole lotta pain, oh
Spineless One."

As Shinji nodded frantically, Ranma released her hold on him and was
about to turn away, when some sticky liquid splashed against her chest.
Staring dumbly at the dark stain spreading across the front of her
shirt, she shook with barely controlled anger. Snapping her head to the
perpetrator, Ranma saw a large punk covered in tattoos smirking evilly.

"My... new outfit... ruined. All the horror... for nothing!"

Eyes burning with fury, Ranma futilely searched the brute's face for any
sign of remorse, waiting for any attempt at an apology. Non was
forthcoming, and a faint green aura surrounded the distraught girl, as
she closed her eyes in a vain attempt to control the raging volcano
within her soul. Droplets of blood started falling on the pavement from
her clenched fists, caused by the wounds from where Ranma's nails dug
deep into her tender flesh.

In a few more moments Ranma would have been able to gather herself and
walk away, but the punk decided to taunt her, showing off before his
buddies. "What's the matter, little girl? Are ya gonna run home cryin'
to yer mommy?"

As images of her mother's lifeless body resurfaced in living colors,
Ranma let out a wordless shout of primal rage, and lashed out at the man
who decided to cross her. Perversion and the terrible memories of her
past had ruined the perfect day with Rei, and someone had to pay for
that.

Once her opponent dropped with a muffled thud on the ground, his buddies
recovered from their shock, and jumped Ranma, as well as the kids around
her.

Ranma was like lightning, zapping past the awkward blows which came her
way while dealing out punishment of her own. This wasn't about winning
the fight as fast as possible, the punks were gonna pay! Pay for the
ruined shirt, pay for the stupid curse, pay for everyone dying... All
rational thought left Ranma's mind as she danced among the multiple
attackers, lashing out at them so fast that no one present could even
see the blows connect.

While the majority of the punks attacked Ranma, a few of them came after
the rest of the group with the understanding that it wouldn't be prudent
to attack such a good fighter. They chose the best course of action -
attacking helpless-looking fourteen-year-old's.

* * *

Asuka immediately sprang into action. A kick to the groin, an elbow to
the ribs and a vicious uppercut dropped three members of the gang before
the rest even knew what hit them. Taking extra precaution from this
point on, the remaining five attackers started circling the group
wearily, looking for an opening. As the sounds of combat from the
majority of their gang attacking Ranma continued, regardless of their
sheer number, the small group of attackers grew more and more restless,
knowing that they were next on the list. Not willing to turn tail and
run without scoring at least one hit against the teenagers, three of
them rushed Asuka at once, while the two others picked themselves other
targets.

Asuka's spin-kick took two of her attackers under the chin, painfully
smacking their jaws shut, as their heads snapped backwards in almost
perfect synchronization. Toji hit the third one on the back of his head
with his school-bag, finally finding some use for the heavy thing. But
two more attackers remained mobile - one heading towards Shinji and the
other about to take a swing at Rei.

The pair of red-heads sprang into action instantaneously. Doing several
back-flips until she'd reached her destination, Asuka assaulted the
would-be attacker with a combination of kicks to the chest, dropping the
man with a powerful axe-kick when he doubled over in pain. Turning
around to see if anyone of the gang was still standing, she found that
her sight had been severely restricted by a dust cloud, which seemed to
appear out of nowhere.

As the dust finally settled down, she couldn't believe her eyes. All
forty of their attackers were lying unconscious, sporting an array of
bruises, while the huge gang member that was about to hit that spineless
boy was actually embedded in a wall several dozen meters away. The red-
head who took the brunt of the gang's assault and came not the worse for
wear was standing, motionless, above the boy, who'd toppled over, trying
to escape his attacker, her right arm still outstretched. But the thing
that piqued Asuka's interest was that for a brief moment she could've
sworn the girl's fist was glowing with a soft blue light.

* * *

Dropping her arm to the side wearily, Ranma sighed and sadly shook her
head. She shouldn't have lost her temper like that. It was a good thing
she'd managed to stop herself from using one of her special techniques
during the fight - no, brawl she'd decided was the most appropriate name
for it. Even using ki to give herself a boost was overkill, but she
wanted the jerks to suffer! Shaking her head once more in an attempt to
rid herself of her morbid thoughts, Ranma decided to exercise more self-
control from now on.

Reaching out a hand to help Shinji to his feet, she asked him, "Hey, are
ya hurt?"

"N-No, R-Ranko-sama. T-Thank you," Shinji barely managed to choke out.
Earlier, when he was groveling for his life, he believed that in the
worst case scenario Ranko would just beat him up rather badly. Seeing
her in action, however, made the young boy revise his opinion of her.
Ranko was dangerous... very dangerous. From what he could see from the
fight, several of her opponents were hit from air pressure alone, but
unfortunately Shinji couldn't verify that theory of his, since he
couldn't even see her hands most of the time! But what'd really shaken
him was the way she'd taken care of the guy who wanted to cave in his
skull. Shinji didn't know what the hell happened! One moment he was
laying on the ground, preparing for the mother of all headaches, and the
next, Ranko was right above him with her arm outstretched! The only
thing that came to his mind when he tried thinking of it was 'god
speed'.

"Cut the crap, Shinji. Just call me Ranko, like everyone else," Ranma
replied in a tired voice. Physically she was fine, but her mind wanted a
long rest from it all.

In the meanwhile, Rei thanked Asuka in her soft monotone, and went over
to stand by Ranma, who was ready to go away from there, when she'd
caught Shinji sneaking a few peeks at her, After several long moments of
this, she finally had enough.

"Alright, out with it!" Ranma commanded, living no room for discussion.

"W-Well, there's something I'd really like to know," Shinji started
saying, twiddling his fingers.

'If he asks for my measurements, even Rei won't save his hentai ass this
time,' Ranma thought darkly, tired of all the beating around the bush.
"Yeah, and...?"

"Why did you save me?" Shinji blurted out, cringing immediately.

Ranma sighed. "There's no need to throw a fit every time you're around
me, Shinji. I'm a pretty nice person, y'know." Ignoring the boy's
doubtful look, Ranma continued, "See, I'm a martial artist. Honor's
pretty much the only thing left for me right now, an' one of the rules
have to follow is protecting people who can't defend themselves."

"In other words, you saved me 'cause I'm a wimp that can't take care of
himself?" Shinji asked quietly, eyes downcast.

"No, that's not what I meant! Will you cut down on the self pity
already?!" Ranma shouted. "What's wrong with all you people around here!
Y'all act like you've had it rough and just decided to take the easy way
out and give in."

The pigtailed girl snorted in disdain.

"Well let me tell you somethin' about pain. I've lost my entire freakin'
family an' all my fiancees right in front of my eyes! Forced to watch
every one of them call out for me, an' I wasn't able to do a damn thing
about it!"

Ranma closed his eyes, and turned away from their small group,
continuing quietly in a quivering voice.

"So don't you dare come to me an' cry about your sorry lives, 'cause
you've got no right, NO RIGHT to say that to me."

Taking a moment to recompose herself, Ranma stared directly into
Shinji's eyes. "If you don't want to be such a pushover," she continued
passionately, "stop acting like one. Grow a spine, 'cause no one else
will do it for you."

After emptying the load off her heart, Ranma jumped to a rooftop of a
three-story building, and quickly ran away. Everyone looked after her
retreating form for a few moments, and afterwards took off running away
in random directions, before the police got to the scene. The only one
remaining behind was Kensuke, who hadn't stopped drooling ever since he
got a chance to see the girls in action...

*****

"R-Rei," Ranma called out unsteadily, waving slightly to the other girl
as she approached their apartment building.

The blue haired girl acknowledged her presence, but other than that,
Ranma had no way of knowing what was going through her mind at the
moment.

'I hope she doesn't hate me for blowing my steam like that and runnin'
off without her,' Ranma thought worriedly, as she waited for Rei to make
the next move.

"I'm sorry," Rei said finally, sympathy briefly showing in her eyes
before they returned to their normal, impassive glance.

"W-What're you sorry about?" Ranma asked fearfully, her heart racing.
'Oh no, what if she doesn't wanna be my friend anymore?'

"I'm sorry you had to suffer so much," she answered, and Ranma could
almost swear there was a bit of emotion in the voice this time.

"I thought I came to terms with it... guess I was wrong, huh?" the red-
head attempted to joke, putting a very strained smile on her face for
her friend.

As Rei nodded mutely, Ranma asked, "Well, let's not talk about it
anymore. What do you wanna do now?"

"We are going to Nerv Headquarters to meet the Second Child."

"Second Child?"

"She is another pilot, who recently arrived to Japan from Germany," Rei
explained to her friend.

"Aww, do we hafta go? It sounds boring like hell," Ranma whined.

"Commander Ikari stated that all present pilots shall attend the
meeting. Since Ranko Saotome hasn't been issued a Nerv ID card, I've
been asked to take her with me," Rei recited, falling back to her
emotionless routine.

Grumbling about 'Commander Ikari this' and 'Commander Ikari that', Ranma
finally agreed to go and followed Rei, as they walked to the train
station.

* * *

Ranma allowed Rei to use her ID card to let them in this time, since she
was now fully authorized to access the underground facility. And since
she'd vowed to herself today to try and avoid any concept of overkill,
using the Umi-Sen-Ken without any real need seemed utterly pointless.

The pair of girls had been rounding the corner, when they heard a
strangely familiar voice shout in frustration, "What's wrong with this
damn machine?!"

As they closed the distance between the source of the voice and them,
the sight of a red-head kicking a door repeatedly revealed before them.

"Hey! What are you..." Ranma started saying, before being cut off by
another voice from behind.

"...doing here?" Shinji lamely finished, as now the eyes of all the
other pilots were upon him.

"I think an introduction is in order," Asuka said, turning to look at
the girls and giving them a lopsided grin, ignoring Shinji altogether.
"I'm the Second Child."

"Ranko's the name, an' they call me Fourth Child; this here's Rei, and
she's the First Child," Ranma introduced the two of them, smiling
slightly herself. The girl was rather nice, and a good fighter - for a
girl anyway - so it didn't seem wise to alienate her from the start.
Plus, there was that little bit that she'd saved Rei earlier, for which
Ranma was grateful. Not that she couldn't have done it herself, but
still...

"Nice to meet you," Rei greeted the new pilot indifferently.

Once everyone turned their eyes back on Shinji, he resisted an urge to
flee the area, and shuffled his feet, introducing himself as the Third
Child.

"Well, I can see you've already met each other," Dr. Akagi noted,
meeting the four pilots in the corridor. "Good. Come with me."

* * *

"Hey, Shin-chan, now you're outnumbered!" Misato exclaimed, patting the
boy on his shoulder. "You must be in heaven! People would kill to trade
places with you!"

Shinji wisely decided that any remark he might make as a response to
this would be his last. In fact, had anyone asked him about his
situation, heaven wouldn't have been his word of choice. It wasn't hell
exactly, either, as the possibility of seeing three attractive girls in
extra elastic plug suits which left little to the imagination was
definitely every guy's fantasy. What those girls could do to him,
however, had they decided he was looking at them the wrong way took a
lot out of the situation's appeal.

Unheeded of her failure to stir a response from Shinji, Misato moved on
to her next target, which was Ranma.

"Oh, I'm so glad you decided to join us, Ranko! Aren't you happy that
you're now mankind's final line of defense?"

"Ecstatic," Ranma replied with as much sarcasm as she could muster,
pointedly ignoring the bubbly Captain. She reminded her too much of
Shampoo, and memories like those had to be avoided at all cost, Ranma
decided early on.

Asuka proved to more enthusiastic, as she gushed on how she was going to
be the best EVA pilot. As her tirade continued, Ranma found herself
evaluating the girl. She had confidence that strongly bordered on
arrogance, a pretty decent fighter and a good EVA pilot, if her fight
with Gagiel was any indication. The girl was not too bad on the eyes,
and on top of it all, she carried herself with an air of superiority.

'Yes, the more I think about it, the more I see that Asuka reminds me
very much of myself,' Ranma estimated, barely holding a smile. 'All the
girl needs is some dark past, and a lifetime years of training, and she
could practically replace me,' she mused, her thoughts turning grim.

"Ranko... Hey, Ranko," Dr. Akagi's voice brought the red-head's mind
back to Earth.

"Yeah? What do you want?" Ranma asked in a strained voice.

"I just wanted to let you know, that since we've found the Fourth Child,
the Americans have finally agreed to transfer Unit 03 to us. It'll be
yours, once it arrives in two weeks," Ritsuko Akagi told their newest
pilot, struggling not to show any signs of annoyance at the girl's
antics. 'One would think she hates being here,' she joked with herself,
not easing her irritation one bit.

"Yay," Ranma merely replied, putting as much cheerfulness into the reply
as a condemned man feels when brought before the executioner.

A gritting of teeth along with the tightening of her jaw were the only
signs of Ritsuko's anger, barely noticeable from a distance. As a smirk
immediately came up on Ranma's face, the Doctor flushed in anger and
stormed out, knowing all too well what that smirk meant. There was only
so much length she would go in a battle of will against some cocky and
annoying fourteen-year-old girl.

Especially if the bratty kid had been winning.

*****

"Grab whatever you want, although the pickles are slim," Misato said to
the children following her around the cafeteria with their trays.

'Ooh, the children look so cute, walking in pairs like that!' she
thought, smiling at them.

Shinji caught that smile and frowned immediately. 'She probably thinks
it's cute or something. Who'd want to walk near two crazy chicks
anyway?'

To prevent matter from escalating, the pilot of Unit 01 asked the woman
tentatively, "Umm... are you allowed to drink on _duty_, Misato?"

Taking a swig from her beer, she waved off his concerns, saying, "Shush
up, Shinji! One doesn't count!"

Sitting down at the table, Misato turned to Asuka and said, "Nice fight
there! We saw it on videotape..."

"You know about the fight?!" the girl asked wide eyed.

"Umm, yes?" Misato offered. "Don't tell anyone, but fighting Angel is
kinda our job. Did you really expect us not to know about your encounter
with Gagiel?"

"Um, yeah. Hehe. Look, here's our table!"

And with that, the Second Child quickly left, leaving a flabbergasted
Misato in her wake.

* * *

"Say, Shinji, does she still sleep sprawled all over the bed?" Kaji
asked casually, smiling.

The reactions around the table varied. Misato and Asuka were shocked
beyond belief, just sitting there wide-eyed and open-mouthed. Rei
continued to eat her food quietly, undisturbed, and Ranma had a smirk on
her face.

Shinji, for his part, smiled and replied, "Yeah, I go wake her up every
morning, and she's so..."

"Wh-Wh-What the Hell are you saying?!" Misato yelled at Kaji, slamming
her palms against the table. "And in front of _children_, no less!"

"Huh? Why's it wrong in front of children?" Shinji asked her, perplexed.

As Misato just stood there, flabbergasted, Ranma replied for her, still
smirking, "Because your guardian thinks you're too young to talk about
sex."

As everyone except Rei turned towards her with expressions of shock on
their faces, Ranma's smirk turned into laughter.

Calming down some time later, she wiped the tears out of her eyes, and
said, "Sorry 'bout that, but you should've seen yourself back then."

Still chuckling, Ranma went back to pick at her food.

"Wait, aren't _you_ a bit too young to talk about something like that?"
Kaji inquired, cocking his head.

"I'm older than I look," Ranma answered between bites. "Besides, I've
had plenty of eager girls chase me around when I was younger."

"Girls?" Asuka manage to say, surprised to no end.

"Yep. I mean, take a look at this body. Is it a babe magnet or what?"
Ranma asked in the most serious tone that she could muster, keeping all
signs of her laughter out of her voice.

At that statement, everyone's jaw dropped, and Rei's eyebrow shot up.
Seeing that no response was forthcoming in the near future, Ranma spoke
again.

"I'm bored, so I think I'll go an' practice or somethin'. Do ya want to
tag along, Rei?"

Standing up, Rei simply answered with "Yes" and followed Ranma out of
the cafeteria. Near the exit Ranma turned around, and winked at Misato
and Asuka, before leaving the room.

Kaji was the first to speak up after that, saying, "What a...
peculiar... girl."

"Schizophrenic is more like it," Shinji grumbled, returning to his food.

* * *

After walking a few minutes through Nerv's corridors, Rei decided to ask
the question that had been bothering her ever since they left the
cafeteria.

"Ranma?"

"Yes?" the red-head said, turning towards her friend.

"Why did you tease everyone back there?"

"What makes you thinks I wasn't serious?" Ranma asked with an innocent
expression. Rei's eyebrow twitched slightly in response.

"Alright, you got me. I just wanted to have some fun, y'know? Ever since
coming here, everything's been so alien... an' I just wanted to pretend,
even for a little while, that I was back home."

"That is how things were at your home?" Rei asked.

"Um, no. That is, I always teased the girls an' all, but they usually
hit me in return," Ranma replied sheepishly, rubbing the back of her
neck in embarrassment.

"Girls... hit you?" Rei asked, not sure whether she heard Ranma right
the first time.

"Yeah, all the time. Mallets, spatulas, bon-bori, tables... you name
it."

Rei walked silently beside Ranma for a minute, thinking about what her
friend had just told her.

"Did you like to get hit by girls?" she finally asked.

"What, are ya crazy? Those things hurt like hell, especially the
table..."

"Then why did you tease girls?"

"Um, I dunno. I can't help it most of the time, my mouth just goes on
auto pilot."

"Like a berserker EVA," Rei commented.

"Err... right. Anyway, that was then. Now... now it's just a reminder,
like I said. The times our gang had back home were violent, but we had
lots of fun as well." Lowering her head, Ranma continued, "And they were
all alive... ouch!"

Turning towards Rei, who was lowering her hand, Ranma was about to yell
'What was that for?', when the blue haired girl spoke softly.

"I'm sorry, but I don't have a mallet."

Blinking several times, Ranma thought about it and smiled, a genuine
smile instead of the mask she wore in the cafeteria.

"Thanks, Rei."

Both pilots started walking again, headed home.

*****

"The Jet Alone demonstration has been scheduled for next week. Is
everything ready, Dr. Akagi?" Commander Ikari asked, sitting behind his
desk.

"Yes. Our contacts have given us the access codes for the robot. After
their 'demonstration', Nerv wouldn't have any competition."

"Good. Have the Fourth Child go with Captain Katsuragi."

"But, Commander... I thought the Third Child was going. What caused the
change in plans?" Dr. Akagi asked, after checking her notes.

"You have your orders. Dismissed," the Commander replied curtly.

"Yes, Sir."

Once Ritsuko Akagi left his office, Commander Ikari opened a file
labeled 'Top Secret' and glanced at it, an evil smile creeping up his
face.

"Let's see how you'll like Jet Alone... Ranma."

*****

End of Chapter 3.



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