From: eltf@hotmail.com (Eliot Lefebvre)
Subject: [Eva][Fanfic] Neon Epoch Evangelion: Episode 14
X-Original-Date: 18 Nov 2002 06:02:24 -0800

Everybody's got something to hide, except for me and my pre-story 
warning:

This fanfic is an original take on GAINAX's "Shin Seiki Evangelion."
It contains alternative characters, plots, and a different overriding
internal logic.  It is intended, from the beginning, to be different.
This includes different Children and different histories.  In short: if 
the mere thought of someone other than Shinji in the cockpit of EVA-01 
makes you queasy, you are in -entirely- the wrong place.  Any and all 
flames stemming from this alteration will be mocked mercilessly.  You 
have been warned.

Not much to say this week, either - I'm working on a big, "secret" 
project that might be more trouble than it's worth, might never come to 
anything, but is proving at least mildly rewarding in the interim.  
More details will be available at Lostfactor.net if they become 
relevant.  Seriously, folks, if you like this, you'll like the site.  I 
promise.

                                  ]++[

               ]+ ELECTRONIC TRANSCENDENCE PRODUCTIONS +[
                                presents

                         ]+ NEON       EPOCH +[
                   ]+ E  V  A  N  G  E  L  I  O  N +[

                   ]+ EPISODE 14:  PARENTAL ECHOES +[

                     By Eliot "Lostfactor" Lefebvre

             Based off of "Shin Seiki Evangelion" by GAINAX

                                  ]++[

Listen, my sons, to a father's instructions;
     pay attention and gain understanding.
- PROVERBS 4:1

                                  ]++[

                                [ 2004 ]

Ritsuko Akagi wanted, more than anything, to hate the woman standing a
few meters away from her as she stared out from the oddly unstable
hallways of the new facility, every conceivable surface marked in black
paint with instructions about what should be fixed and what needed to
be moved.  The other woman, relatively tall with auburn hair and a
certain austere grace about her, was standing in what seemed to be the
nexus from which all of the construction on the building was
concentrated.  Half of the room was colored in musty dropcloths, sparks
flew madly, and the scent of welding metal and drying paint filled the
air as workers scrambled about, the woman in question only barely
seeming to notice them.  Ritsuko wanted to hate her, to hate her for
what she was doing with her life, what she'd done with Ritsuko's life,
but she found it impossible to get her emotions to concentrate against
her mother, like trying to drown a fish.

Offering a few more gestures to the workers clustered around her, the
elder woman turned around and smiled at Ritsuko, taking quick steps
towards her daughter and waving with one hand.  Ritsuko forced a smile
and waved back, feeling the stares of everyone in the room turn towards
her, knowing that simply by being the daughter of Naoko Akagi she'd
become something of a central attraction for the staff of Gehirn.  "I
didn't think that you'd get here so fast," her mother said, grinning as
she set her clipboard down on a folding card table, apparently
unconcerned with the thought of someone taking it.  "Is the train
already up to full speed?"

"The engineer said that he'd make sure to get me here on time," replied
Ritsuko with an awkward blush, knowing that everyone around her was
comparing her to her mother.  It was an uneasy comparison for her,
especially since she knew how similar they looked - the same blue-gray
eyes, the same short auburn hair, even the same height.  If it wasn't
for the fact that Ritsuko kept her hair slightly longer, they could
have been twins.  "It was a little tense moving over the new tracks,
but I think they're concrete.  Tokyo-3 is practically the nerve center
of Japan now, anyways."

"Mm.  People can't seem to move here fast enough."  Naoko took a deep
breath, then sloughed off her lab coat, revealing the strictly
utilitarian yellow blouse and brown pants she wore underneath, making
Ritsuko feel extremely overdressed in her school uniform, the white
fabric folding in upon itself as the woman tossed the coat idly atop
her clipboard.  "Well, without me, the project won't be going anywhere,
so we can take as long as we like for lunch."  She paused for a moment,
then stepped out into the hallway with Ritsuko.  "Your friend Misato
won't be joining us?"

"She had to study," replied Ritsuko, her eyes focused more on the
monolithic structures behind her mother than anything else.  She had
thought at first that they were part of the wall, but looking at them
more closely they were obviously intended to be something else, though
what was a complete mystery.  Black piping was being slowly assembled
underneath what looked like a gigantic white box, technicians
scrambling around with laptop computers and soldering irons.  "Mother?"
she asked hesitantly, tilting her head slightly to one side.  "What are
those?"

Naoko frowned at Ritsuko for a moment, then followed the young woman's
gaze over to the monolithic structures and let her frown evaporate into
a grin.  "I thought we weren't going to talk about work anymore," she
said good-naturedly, Ritsuko fully aware that the woman would rather
speak about her work as opposed to nearly anything else.  Surely
enough, Naoko had turned fully to face the structures, arms folding
across her chest defiantly.  "Those are the beginnings of the Magi.
They're intended to be Gehirn's biggest asset."

Ritsuko began to glance towards her mother for an explanation, but the
woman hadn't finished, something that Ritsuko inwardly scolded herself
somewhat bitterly for not realizing.  "They're extrapolations of the
work that I did on the human brain as a computer when I was your age -
three clone brains as the central processors of the most powerful
computers to ever exist."  She smiled at her daughter, noticing the odd
look that had come over the younger woman's face.  "I used my own brain
as the template.  No matter what happens, as long as Gehirn exists,
I'll be within it, the core of the technology developed here."  She
paused, lowering her head slightly, her smile becoming oddly
bittersweet.  "Not that anyone would notice, I suppose.  But it's easy
to feel some measure of pride in that, to think of the implications
generations from now."

Tilting her head slightly to one side, Ritsuko blinked, then glanced
back towards the monolithic computers, understandably made somewhat
squeamish by the thought of her mother's brain wired into a machine.
"Why three of them?" she asked hesitantly, trying unsuccessfully to
force out the diquieting image in her mind, knowing that however
distasteful it was it was a necessary evil.

"More is better," replied Naoko somewhat cryptically, smiling at her
daughter as though she was discussing something perfectly normal.
"Three machines can't have a tied decision.  They'll always produce
some kind of result whenever the staff of Gehirn provides them with a
question."  She paused, then blushed slightly as she looked back at the
computers, her attention obviously on the machines instead of Ritsuko.
It was something that the woman did often, something that Ritsuko had
grown accustomed to but still didn't particularly like.  "And they
represent the three facets of who I am.  One for myself as a scientist,
one for myself as a woman -" she hesitated briefly, looking down
towards Ritsuko "- and one for myself as a mother."

A rather snide comment offered itself as Ritsuko stared at the
monolithic computers once again, but she held it back, not wanting the
little time that she was able to spend with her mother to be marred so
quickly.  "You never talked about them when you wrote to me," she said
calmly, trying to restrain the resentment she felt inside her chest,
simply folding her hands and letting them hang in front of her as she
stared at her mother.  "I would have been interested."

Naoko smirked once again, this time somewhat bitterly, as she began to
move through the hallways of Gehirn's command facility, leading Ritsuko
along through the still-unfinished corridors and past various points of
heavy construction.  "Technically, you're still not supposed to know,"
she said quietly, winking back towards her daughter as she turned a
corner and stepped gingerly over a series of wooden slats covering a
hole in the floor.  Ritsuko hesitated for a moment, then followed her
mother, her body tensing slightly as she heard the wood creak beneath
her.  "We'll just keep it our little secret."  Not waiting for any sort
of approval from the younger woman, Naoko stopped in front of one of
the sliding doors, pressing down on a button and letting it slide open
with what sounded like an almost tortured whine of gears.

As the door slid open, Ritsuko could see two men approaching the women,
talking between themselves in hushed and urgent tones in a manner that
implied more a consideration of others than a need for privacy.  Naoko
stared for a second, then reached back and grabbed Ritsuko's wrist,
yanking her daughter forward as she stepped over to the pair.  "Dr.
Ikari, Dr. Fuyutsuki," she said, her tone sounding somewhere between
eager and respectful.  "I didn't expect to see the two of you in here.
Do you have a moment?"

"Of course, Dr. Akagi," replied the man on the left, reaching up and
gently adjusting his thin-framed glasses, the fluorescent lights of the
newly-constructed corridors glinting momentarily off of the lenses.
Ritsuko frowned briefly, trying to remember her mother's description of
the heads of Gehirn, wondering if she'd ever described someone who
looked as prematurely old as the man standing before her.  He had a
thin face and high cheekbones, looking somewhat gaunt despite the fact
that he was obviously of normal build.  A white lab coat hung loosely
from his frame, covering a simple navy blue turtleneck and black pants,
his brownish-black hair unkempt, eyes beady and almost disturbingly
focused.  Those eyes flicked over to Ritsuko, and a thinly humorless
smile drifted slowly across his face.  "I assume this is your daughter?"

"Ritsuko, yes," replied Naoko with a nod, reaching back towards her
daughter and pushing her forward gently, an uncomfortable sensation as
the beady-eyed man stared at her intently.  "Ritsuko, this is Dr.
Ikari, head of Gehirn -" she gestured towards the same man that she had
been speaking to, the thought of the oddly-intense man running such an
important project sending a slight tremor through Ritsuko "- and Dr.
Fuyutsuki."  For the first time, Ritsuko let her eyes rest on the other
man, feeling unsure of whether to be surprised or not by his
appearance.  If Dr. Ikari looked old beyond his years, Fuyutsuki looked
young beyond his years - there was still a quickness in his brown eyes
despite his obviously-graying hair, a certain nobility to his bearing
and expression despite his age.  "I'm sure I've mentioned them before
in my letters."

Nodding, Ritsuko extended her hand towards Dr. Ikari, who took it
without protest and shook it firmly, still smiling at her approvingly.
Ritsuko frowned ever so slightly, but she tried her best to force the
emotion under the surface, shaking the hand of Dr. Fuyutsuki as well,
somehow feeling less intimidated by the elder man.  "It's a pleasure to
meet both of you," she said calmly, giving a slight respectful bow to
the two doctors, still feeling somewhat put off by Dr. Ikari.

"With all the time your mother spends at work here, I'm surprised she
even has a daughter," noted Fuyutsuki casually, earning a smile from
Ritsuko and a slight frown from Naoko.  The sight of her mother
displeased seemed to dampen the doctor as well, and he flicked his eyes
briefly over towards her before looking back towards the younger
woman.  "Are you planning on following in her footsteps?  You'll be
attending university very soon, so I don't doubt it's on your mind."

Blushing slightly, Ritsuko nodded respectfully, unsure of whether to
feel flattered or embarassed by the thought of being so predictably
like her mother.  She let her own eyes flick briefly over towards the
older woman, seeing her lips moving and hearing soft noise coming from
her mouth, realizing that she was whispering something to Ikari.  "I
was planning on it, actually," she said, knowing that Fuyutsuki was
expecting a response even as she wanted to be anywhere but the hallway,
the urge to be anything besides her mother growing in the back of her
mind, as though she wanted to scream something at the other woman.

Fuyutsuki, either ignoring the scene between mother and dauther
intentionally or just not noticing it, simply smiled at the younger
woman.  "I know it's probably not on your list, but I used to be a
professor over at Kyoto University.  If you need someone to put a good
word in for you, just ask."  He paused, flicking his eyes towards Naoko
quickly.  "Knowing how smart your mother is, it's be a waste of a
brilliant mind if you didn't get to go where you wanted to."  Once
again, his eyes flicked towards Naoko, and Ritsuko couldn't keep from
clenching her fist in anger, the gesture cutting her more deeply than
she'd expected.  She knew that he was simply making sure that her
mother didn't get angry again, but it felt as though she was being
ignored on her own merits, still standing in her mother's shadow.

Opening her mouth to reply to the doctor, Ritsuko found her mother
stepping in front of her and nodding to the older man, another gesture
that seemed to be tailored specifically to irritate her.  "I appreciate
the offer, Dr. Fuyutsuki," Naoko offered politely, dipping her head
slightly and stepping to one side of the hallway.  "My apologies for
keeping you so long - I know that you're busy.  I hope that everything
goes well today."

Both of the doctors nodded and gave quick waves goodbye, walking down
the hallway away from Ritsuko and Naoko, once again speaking in quiet
tones between one another.  It was only after they seemed to be out of
sight that Naoko turned towards her daughter once again, as though
she'd forgotten about the younger woman waiting for her.  "Well.  Now
you've met two of the most important people in Gehirn."  She was
smiling, as though nothing abnormal had happened.  "So, ready to go to
lunch?"

Ritsuko wanted to slap her mother.  She wanted to feel hate boiling in
her stomach, to simply strike the other woman as hard as she could, to
let her hand find her mother's cheek and hear the stinging noise of the
slap, to scream at her that she wasn't to be ignored.  But try as she
might, she couldn't make herself feel the hatred and bile that she knew
she deserved to feel, that Naoko had given her every reason for.  That
fact in and of itself made her want to hate the woman even more, but
instead she simply nodded coldly and politely, watching her mother turn
and continue leading her onward, ignoring her daughter even though she
was standing only a few feet away.

                                  ]++[

                                [ 2016 ]

Her long black hair smelled faintly of vanilla and lilac, each strand
perfectly smooth and narrow, flowing together with the rest of the long
thick mass as though she had a river of hair rather than having it
actually growing from her head.  It was one of the things about herself
that Niobe took pride in, the way that her long black hair flowed
around behind her, something that even Joseph was pleased with.  He
said that it showed her dedication, that she took enough time and
concentration to care for it that it wound up looking so unceasingly
beautiful, as though his daughter was a goddess in body as well as in
action.  But for the first time that she could remember, Niobe looked
at the hair and saw anything but a tribute to her efficiency, instead
looking and seeing a misplaced glut of effort.

Sighing heavily, Niobe shifted her body slightly, throwing her hair off
of her shoulder, letting the black mass brush against her back as she
felt the smooth white fabric of the sheets beneath her brush against
the bottom of her legs.  The thought that she was wasting even more
time by the simply sitting on her bed in her underwear trying to figure
out whether or not to cut her hair popped into her head for not the
first time, and sighing she flopped backwards, staring up at the
fluorescent light in the ceiling of her room, oddly comfortable in the
warmth of the apartment against the messy sheets.  "If Ryo walked in
here now, maybe he'd be attracted to me," she muttered to herself
almost idly.  "Maybe it's a good idea not to get dressed."

The thought made her blush at the same moment that it made her somewhat
happy, the simple concept of Ryo seeing her almost naked at once
frustrating her with the thought of the boy even as she took some
comfort in the possibility that he might finally notice her.  She had
been giving her all since she'd come to Tokyo-3, but no matter how hard
she tried it didn't seem to matter to him, and his attention remained
curiously focused on Nieve.  "Even after the Tenth Angel," she
whispered into the air, the words feeling like a weight placed on her
chest.  "I've got to be doing something wrong.  That's the only
possible explanation."

Almost unintentionally, Niobe found herself thinking back to her most
recent conversation with her parents, and she rolled onto her side,
feeling the sheets tickle against her chocolate skin as she curled her
legs up against her chest and clutched them with her arms.  She'd
gotten a call from Joseph the day after the Tenth Angel incident, early
in the morning, still fresh in her mind even though it had been a full
day since then.  He had seemed proud, but only grudgingly so, as though
Niobe was failing in some critical areas.  "I wanted to tell him about
Ryo," she whispered.  "But I couldn't."  A slow trickle of tears began
to fill in her eyes as she remembered the harsh words he'd spoken to
her when she brought up the concept of dating, how angry he'd seemed
with the basic idea.

Opening her mouth wide, Niobe let a deep breath fill her lungs, then
pushed herself back to a sitting position and stared at her hair
again.  "It's not unreasonable to assume it could be a distraction,"
she muttered to herself, an odd tightness growing in her chest.  "I
spend a great deal of time caring for it.  If I just reduced the amount
that I cared for... I would still be beautiful."  She paused, her chest
continuing to hurt as she thought of what she might look like with
shorter hair.  "And then I wouldn't have this distraction holding me
back.  I could do as good as I ought to.  Ryo would finally notice me."

Her hands unconsciously twitched, clenched, then relaxed again as she
flipped her hair back over her shoulder and letting it wash down her
back once again.  She wanted the whole process to be as quick and
painless as before, as simple as when she'd decided that her personal
belongings had to go, but somehow it felt as though cutting her hair
was a way of acknowledging defeat, of saying that she simply couldn't
maintain her hair on top of everything else.  Instinctively, she felt
the urge to ask Joseph for her thoughts, then she remembered how angry
he had been before, and she shook her head, determined to leave him be
for the time being.  He wouldn't want to think that his daughter
couldn't make her own decisions.

"Besides, I don't want to talk to him," sighed Niobe, shutting her eyes
and squeezing them tightly, feeling the muscles in her body tense
almost unconsciously as she remembered her father's angry words.  He
was displeased that she hadn't been sent into actual combat against the
Seventh Angel, that she had been so easily taken out against the
Ninth.  She had deflected the criticisms as best she could, but in her
heart she knew that he was right, that she hadn't performed as well as
she should have in both of the battles.  "Small wonder Ryo wouldn't
notice me.  I'm not nearly as good as I ought to be."  Her emotions
confused once again, she felt herself wavering on her singular decision
about her hair, reaching over her shoulder and touching the smooth
length again.

Then the knob of her door turned, and she had only seconds to stare
before the door opened and Ryo stood in front of her, wearing his
school uniform despite the fact that it was Saturday.  He didn't seem
to have any other clothing from what Niobe had seen, but she was far
less concerned with his clothing than with her own utter lack of
anything modest, nothing except the thin lace of her bra and panties
between her skin and the open air.  Her entire body tensed hard as the
boy stared at her, and for a moment she wondered what the boy was going
to do, if he was finally looking at her seriously, even as she felt her
hands drifting towards the thin white sheet to cover herself.

Ryo simply stood for a moment, motionless, and Niobe stared into the
boy's red eyes, trying to gauge what he was thinking, hands relaxing
their grip on the sheets as she stared.  His eyes betrayed nothing
except simple observation, and the thought of his gaze simply looking
upon her as though she was fully clothed made her hands release the
sheet out of simultaneous frustration and comfort.  It was more
comfortable being almost naked around him, knowing that he wasn't
thinking of her as a sex object, but she wanted him to think that about
her, and the fact that he obviously didn't in such overt circumstances
made things even worse.  "Ryo," she said, gingerly raising one arm to
cross across her chest, unsure of wheter she was trying to obscure her
breats or push them forward.  "You should have knocked."

"I apologize," replied Ryo, still apparently unaware of the girl's near-
nudity, a fact that began to sting far more than it made her feel
comfortable.  His body was still relaxed, exhibiting none of the
outward signs of restrained sexual tension, just a casual observation
of the girl who simply happened not to be wearing any clothing.  It was
beginning to make her very consciously aware of how unsuccessful she'd
been at making the boy notice her, and she let her hand fall back
towards the sheets, pulling them up to try and cover her body.  "I came
in to let you know that we received a call from Central Dogma."

Niobe forced herself to pay attention, to push the personal concerns
just underneath the surface of her skin out of her mind, hoping that
the boy would take note of what she was doing.  "What did they say?"
she asked, letting her hands release the sheet as she stood, taking a
deep breath and trying to push her chest forward slightly.  She
couldn't understand for the life of her why he wasn't reacting in some
fashion - even if he didn't think she was particularly pretty, she
found it difficult to accept the fact that a teenage boy wouldn't react
at all to a vaguely-sexual situation.

"We're needed for early testing," replied Ryo, apparently unconcerned
with Niobe's appearance still, his entire body still looking as relaxed
as ever.  "Dr. Akagi has developed a new test that she wants us to
undergo as soon as possible.  We're expected there within thirty
minutes."  He paused, as though he was remembering something else from
the call, eyes focusing briefly on a part of the room other than Niobe,
serving only to make her feel even worse.  "I assume that you can be
dressed by then?"

"Yes.  Of course."  Niobe bit her lower lip, watching as the boy left,
feeling incredibly distant from him even at the same time that she
wanted him to stay.  There was a part of her that wanted him to see her
naked, even though he didn't seem to be reacting, that wanted him to
embrace her even if he was still wearing his school uniform.  "Wait!"
she snapped just before he'd closed the door, freezing the boy's pale
white arm in position, drawing his gaze back in her direction even as
she struggled to figure out some legitimate reason to delay him.  "Do
you..."  She paused, then tilted her head slightly, feeling her hair
brush across her skin and suddenly getting an idea.  "What do you think
of my hair?"

The question seemed to baffle the boy, a situation that she was
relatively accustomed to when asking ostensibly obvious questions.
"It's there," he replied at length, letting his red eyes flick towards
the African girl's black tresses for just a moment, almost as if he was
trying to make sure that it was actually there as he'd expected.  He
stared at her hair for a second, then turned his eyes back towards her,
the unspoken implication that she should have known that it was there
without being told.

"But is it..."  She gritted her teeth, trying to figure out how to
phrase her question, knowing that Nieve's hair wasn't much longer than
hers.  Thinking of Nieve gave her an idea of how to ask the question,
and she tilted her head slightly to give him a fuller view of the
length of the black mass.  "Would you like it if I cut it shorter?
I've been thinking that it's taking too much time to care for, so it
might help me be a more effective pilot to cut it.  What do you think?"

Ryo simply stared for a moment, as if the mere concept of expressing
his opinion was foreign to his knowledge.  "I'm certain I don't know,"
he said after a moment, his words sounding almost bitter, just the
faintest hint of inflection in the sentence managing to give Niobe the
impression that she was annoying him to unspeakable levels by simply
asking such a simple question.  "Knock on my door when you're ready to
leave.  I will be waiting."

"All right," replied Niobe somewhat weakly, simply staring into
nothingness as the boy closed the door behind him.  Niobe stood a
moment longer, vaguely aware after the door was shut that fluid was
running paths down her face and neck, pooling against the soft brown
skin of her breats and soaking into her bra.  Her tears weren't of
sadness so much as simple frustration, and she tried to remind herself
of that fact, but she still felt like a failure for being unable to
control her emotions enough to refrain from crying.  Sniffling
slightly, she wiped the tears away, mentally scolding herself as she
turned and walked towards her closet, utterly baffled as to what Ryo
saw when he looked at her.

                                  ]++[

The massive test holding bay had been filled with water, but to even a
casual observer it would have been clear that there was far more in the
testing area than simple water, though the slight murk in the water
might have made the white shapes within difficult to make out.  Even
though Ritsuko couldn't pick out the details as she would have liked,
she knew that the gigantic test dummies for the Evas were in there,
their nerve input signals wired remotely to the actual Evas.  It was an
ambitious project, and she knew that, but putting NERV over budget to
see if it could work was well worth the minor strain involved.  "Maya,
run another quick impulse through the dummies for 02 and 05.  I don't
like the neural interference ratings."

"Yes, ma'am," replied Maya curtly, her tone not implying any sort of
bitterness but a simple desire to follow Ritsuko's orders to the
fullest of her ability.  Ritsuko glanced back towards the short-haired
young woman, the whitewashed computer terminal that she sat at
contrasting with the teal-gray walls of the square observation booth
but blending perfectly with the other terminals scattered about the
room.  "Both dummies are currently at 13% contamination of the neural
pulse.  That's still two percent higher than the other units."

"European model," muttered Ritsuko, shaking her head as she stared out
at the vague outlines of the dummies.  She'd protested the idea of
having more than one production model on the basis that it would leave
some technology expected to be standard for NERV without a baseline
compatibility, but the European Union had threatened to pull their
support if they weren't allowed a domestic production model.  It
Sighing, the blonde woman rubbed her brow for a moment, leaning on a
rail set slightly back from the window that bulged out into the holding
tank, trying to think.  "All right, we've been trying to bring those
two in line since this morning.  Maya, can you increase the
contamination in the other units?"

Ritsuko couldn't help but smile at the sound of the other woman's gasp,
having expected a similar reaction when she made the request.  "Ma'am?
You're kidding, aren't you?"

"We need to have all six Evas running with some common baseline, or we
can't be certain about any of the data that this experiment collects.
If we can't bully those two into line, we can push the other three out
of line.  It's not the ideal situation, but it's better than having our
data all over the field."  She smiled somewhat bitterly, catching the
sheer irony in the fact that she was sabotaging her own experiment.
"Besides, the Magi can compensate for up to 20% contamination of the
neural pulse.  We'll be best off just getting consistent results."

Maya said nothing for a moment, simply staring at Ritsuko in awe with
her brown.  Then she shook her head, nodding at the older woman and
letting her fingers fly across the keyboard once again, punching in
commands as fast as she possibly could, the noise of clicking keys
likely dizzying to anyone other than Ritsuko.  "Done, ma'am.  All six
Evas are currently at 13% contamination."

"Good," replied Ritsuko distantly, letting her blue-gray eyes focus on
the vague white outlines of the dummies, beginning to see the shape of
the Evas in them even though she could barely make out the general
space that they occupied.  She was apprehensive about this experiment,
but she knew that it was worth it, and she knew that her internal
preoccupation had nothing to do with that.  There was something about
the basic nature of what she was trying to do that left her feeling
vaguel disquieted, as though simply being where she was was somehow
wrong.  "Prepare all systems to begin recording data once the Children
enter the plugs."

The young woman operating the primary terminal said some kind of
respectful acknowledgement, but had someone asked Ritsuko exactly what
she had said she wouldn't have had the vaguest idea.  Her focus was on
the clear tank still, trying to figure out if the basic principle was
sound or not.  In the back of her mind, she knew that she was doing the
right thing, that she was trying to keep the Children as safe as
possible.  "But is that really what I'm trying to do?" she whispered to
herself, still leaning on the rail, flicking her gaze up towards the
top of the tank where the entry plugs sat and awaited their pilots, the
vaguely-murky water lapping gently against the sides of the tank.  "Is
keeping them safe a peripheral benefit to our ultimate goals?"

"Dr. Akagi?"  The voice only barely managed to penetrate Ritsuko's
thoughts, and it took her another moment or two to realize that it was
Maya's soft, respectful voice speaking to her, her tone as reverent as
ever.  Slowly, Ritsuko tuirned her head to face the other woman, making
a smile appear on her lips in hopes that the young woman wouldn't think
something was wrong.  "Commander Ikari is requesting that you call him
at the lower levels, ma'am.  He says he has some questions about
Ayanami's latest status report."

Ritsuko nodded, pushing back from the rail and turning towards the lone
telephone mounted within the wall of the observation chamber, white
fabric of her lab coat brushing against her legs slightly as she began
to move.  "Please step out while I talk with the commander, Maya," the
scientist said gently but firmly, receiving no protest from the younger
woman, simply a quick nod and swift motions to stand from her chair and
leave the room.  Ritsuko watched as she left, leaving only the blonde
woman standing and holding the phone, glancing down quickly at her
attire, remembering the day that she'd first met Dr. Ikari and the coat
that her mother had been wearing.  A bitter smile drifted across her
face for just an instant, then she shook her head and dialed in the
number where she knew the commander would be.

                                  ]++[

Nieve had noticed from the first day that the girl's locker room was
far too large, as though NERV's primary branch had been expecting far
more Children than actually existed.  On some level, she understood
that it was a government facility and had to be equipped to deal with
advanced circumstances, that it needed to be capable of moving beyond
its current accomodations.  Even the locker in NERV's European facility
was too big, considering that Nieve was the only one of the Children
that ever used it.  However, there were four lockers in the girl's room
there for a single child, not thirty-nine in rows of thirteen for three
Children.  "Government spending," she muttered to herself, tilting her
head back momentarily and staring at the fluorescent light above her.

Sighing and shaking her head, she took a deep breath, then began to
pull off the maroon t-shirt she'd picked out for the day, feeling a
twinge of discomfort as she placed the shirt within her locker, as
exposed as she'd ever felt.  It was nothing entirely new, and she'd
long gotten over her apprehension that the teal-gray walls of the room
around her were watching her, that somewhere within the showers lurked
some perverted technician with a video camera.  "But this is the first
time that I'm not going to be able to don my plugsuit," she muttered
somewhat dejectedly, staring at the red suit hanging on a hook within
her locker, tilting her head slightly to one side and examining the
patterns running along it casually.

Biting her lip gently, Nieve began to reach back and unhook her bra,
then paused and stopped, the very thought feeling somewhat repulsive to
her.  She didn't want anyone other than Neil seeing her naked, and even
Neil would probably lose what little attraction he felt towards her if
he saw her like that.  Closing her eyes for just a second, she stood
and turned, walking towards the row of lockers behind her where she
knew Niobe sat.  She didn't particularly want to talk to Eiko for her
own reasons, but she knew Niobe, knew that the girl would be more than
willing to talk to her.  Pressing her body against the side of the
lockers, she peeked her head around towards Niobe, her mouth open to
begin talking.

Then she hesitated for a moment, staring, lost in a moment of profound
shock, and her mouth snapped shut again.  She remembered sunbathing at
least once with Niobe, seeing what the girl looked like underneath her
clothes, and she remembered her having significantly more meat on her
bones than she saw now.  It was something only barely noticable, but as
the African girl folded her blue jeans and placed them in her locker
Nieve could see the vague hints of her ribcage showing beneath the
white bra that the girl wore, her arms almost imperceptibly thinner.
Niobe said nothing for a moment, then turned her head towards Nieve
somewhat indignantly, obviously having been aware of the girl's
presence for some time.  "What are you doing?" she asked indignantly,
tilting her head to one side.

"Niobe... you..."  Nieve felt a growing tightness in her throat, her
legs beginning to grow oddly weak at the sight of the girl in front of
her, even as she struggled to regain control over herself.  She knew
that what she was looking at simply reminded her of an earlier time in
her life on an academic level, but somehow the fact of the matter did
nothing to make her feel any better.  Closing her eyes for the barest
of seconds, she gritted her teeth, then stared at Niobe, knowing full
well that the other girl was wondering what was going on but determined
to keep things under some kind of control.  "Niobe, have you been
eating enough lately?"

For a moment, Niobe said nothing, and Nieve worried that the girl was
going to push her away out of hand, that she was going to even be mad
at Nieve for asking such a personal question.  Then she laughed,
somewhat bitterly but otherwise normally, and Nieve felt vaguely better
about the situation.  "Yes, I've been eating, Nieve," replied Niobe,
shaking her head.  "I've lost a little weight, I know.  I weigh myself
before I get out of the shower each day.  But I've been eating."

Biting her lower lip once again, Nieve forced herself not to say that
it didn't look like she was telling the truth, knowing that she was
meddling in the other girl's affairs even without an interrogation.
Pausing for just a moment, she stepped out from behind the lockers and
sat down on the bench near Niobe, gesturing for the African girl to sit
down next to her.  Niobe gave her an odd look, but she acquiesced,
moving delicately and slowly to the indicated seat.  "You're really not
at a point in your life where you should be losing weight, you know,"
she said softly, feeling at once guilty and pained.  "This is when your
body is developing."

"I know, Nieve.  I took biology, human development, all those classes.
You don't have to explain it to me."  She sighed, shaking her head
lightly, feeling somewhat self-conscious.  "I don't know.  I've just
been focusing so much of my energy on beiong a better Eva pilot that
I've been slipping a little as far as eating goes.  It's irresponsible
of me, I know, but..."  She shrugged.  "Just how things go, I suppose.
The Angels won't be attacking forever, so I'll worry about it once
that's taken care of."

"Don't bloody -say- that!" snapped Nieve, lunging over and gripping
Niobe's shoulders firmly, letting her fingers press hard into the
African girl's chocolate-colored shoulders, feeling the other girl
wince slightly at the sheer violence of her reaction.  It took her a
moment to realize what she was doing, and she felt her grip loosen as
the facts flooded back into her mind, the sheer absurdity of her
actions feeling obvious.  A blush rose to her face, the loss of control
on her part too obvious to hope that Niobe would overlook it.  "I'm
sorry.  I just... I just worry about you."

Niobe stared at Nieve for a moment, but the other girl's face betrayed
no hints of her true emotion, as though the girl was purposely hiding
the truth for some reason.  It served only to make Niobe more curious,
and for a moment she considered trying to make the girl talk to her,
another challenge that she had to undertake.  Then she bit her lip,
knowing that she had more than enough to deal with, feeling a pang of
guilt for admitting it to herself but knowing that Joseph would approve
of her focusing on the most important tasks.  "Nieve, is there
something you need to tell me?" she asked, trying to sound casually,
not opposed to successfully getting the girl to open up if it was
possible even if she didn't want to make it a priority.

"Sorry.  It's just something I feel passionately about."  She paused
for a moment, something underneath her words implying that she was
leaving out part of the story, and she turned towards the other girl,
smirking slightly, no hints of the truth on her face.  "Just... promise
me that you'll take care of yourself, okay?  You and me, we're the
daughters of NERV."  The phrase brought a smile to Niobe's face as
well, and they shared a quiet chuckle.  "Have to stick together, you
know."

"I know.  Sorry."  Niobe stared at Nieve, trying to figure out what she
felt towards the other girl, resentment and kinship clashing within her
chest in equal amounts.  On one level, she wanted to hate the other
girl for what she represented, for the way that she usurped Ryo's
affections, kept Ryo from looking at her.  But on some level she
couldn't be sure if it was Nieve's fault or not, and a sneaking
suspicion whispering at the back of her mind wanted her to believe that
it was because she simply hadn't shown herself to be good enough.
"You're right, I should focus on eating better."  The statement seemed
to make Nieve feel better, and Niobe took a deep breath, her emotions
still conflicted, something tightening within her chest and clogging
her throat.  "So, why did you come over?"

                                  ]++[

All six Children had been offered direct elevators from the locker
rooms to the hallway that led to their entry plugs, but a certain
sophomoric attitude had seemed to take over as soon as the Children
found themselves actually standing at one end of the pure white hall,
the fluorescent lighting serving to make the whole thing seem even more
eerie.  Watching from the observation booth, Ritsuko couldn't help but
sigh, having vaguely anticipated a similar reaction from the Children
but not watning to actually deal with it.  "Walk to your entry plugs,"
she said firmly, speaking into the audio microphone mounted near the
observation window.  "The tests can't begin until you do."

Standing at the end of the hallway, Ryo, apparently unconcerned with
his nudity, began walking quite casually towards his entry plug, the
sound of his bare feet slapping gently against the corridor serving as
an odd sort of rythym as her arms swung next to his side.  Niobe,
watching the boy walk, felt a sudden rush of embarassment, reminding
herself that she of all people should have been perfectly enthusiastic
about getting inside of the cockpit, discarding silly issues of
sentimentality for effectiveness.  Gritting her teeth, she forced the
embarassment out of her mind and took a few steps forward, the air
around her smelling oddly sterile as she walked only a few steps behind
Ryo, unable to keep from admiring him slightly.

Nieve still stood in the elevator, one arm crossed against her breasts
and one shielding her crotch from unwanted observation.  She glanced
quickly at the similarly-restrained Eiko, the Japanese girl seemingly
unsure of whether or not to blush, and sighing heavily she leaned
towards Niobe.  "Niobe!" she hissed, glancing towards the boys, feeling
the same indecision as before at the thought of Neil seeing her naked
as she caught sight of the boy's rather embarassed look.  "Get back
here!  We've got to stick together to protest this!"  She paused,
obviously reaching.  "Daughters of NERV, remember?"

"In that case, you should be sticking with me," said Niobe somewhat
curtly, looking towards Ryo for some kind of approval.  She knew that
she'd done the exact sort of thing that he'd done, but she saw only the
barest flicker of acknowledgement from him, something that sent a wave
of mixed anger and sorrow through her before bleeding into
frustration.  "This is to defeat the Angels.  That has to come before
our personal insecurities."

The African girl's words stung Nieve like a slap across the cheek, as
if the girl knew exactly why she'd been so worried about her
nourishment before.  Taking a deep breath, the girl glanced down at her
body, watching the strands of her red hair drape over her shoulder with
a slow motion, reminding herself to ignore what her mind told her about
the way that she looked.  "All right," she muttered angrily, stepping
out and walking swiftly, feeling her entire face turn a bright red even
as she felt slightly excited by the prospect of Neil seeing her body.
"But Vash, you'd better not be staring at my butt."

Eiko shouted something mirroring Nieve's statement, but Niobe's
attention had already moved off of the the other Children, picking up
her pace and reaching her entry plug almost at the same moment that Ryo
did.  For the briefest of seconds she considered trying to catch a
better glimpse of the boy naked, but she shook her head, knowing that
it would be a bad plan, climbing into the entry plug with minor effort,
lowering her body onto the smooth nylon seat.  It felt different
against her bare back, at once comfortable and oddly dirty, but she
focused on the situation at hand, reaching up and pulling the hatch
above her shut.  "EVA-05 ready," she announced out of instinct, feeling
the slight lurch as her entry plug began to move towards the dummy.

Standing within the booth, Ritsuko watched with some amusement as the
plugs began to move, watching the smooth white cylinders dip into the
water for the first time even as she heard the hiss of the doors
opening behind her.  It took her a second to acknowledge that someone
was entering the room, then she glanced over her shoulder to see Misato
approaching, obviously slightly disorganized, her hair just dissheveled
enough to indicate that she'd been running.  "You're late," announced
Ritsuko flatly, turning her gaze back towards the tank of water idly,
knowing that the other woman was moving forward to stand next to her.
"We should be ready to start in just a couple of minutes."

"Congratulations.  I didn't think you'd be able to get six teenagers to
walk through that hallway naked."  Misato was trying to make it sound
as though she'd been late intentionally, something that Ritsuko knew
wasn't the truth simply from her extended experience with the other
woman.  There was an awkward pause between the two, the events of the
past few days obviously weighing on the minds of both, then Misato
leaned over the rail to mirror Ritsuko, staring out into the tank along
with the blonde as the clicking of computer keyboards filled the air.
"Remember when we were that age?"

"All too well," replied Ritsuko, closing her eyes for just a moment,
letting herself think again on the day that she'd met Dr. Ikari for the
first time, the way that her mother had acted towards her.  Something
about the elder woman was sticking in Ritsuko's mind even as she tried
to purge it, as though Naoko Akagi was still around within her
daughter's mind and refused to leave during such an important
experiment.  Shaking her head, she turned back towards the rows of
computers, taking some solace in the simple fact that she knew the
people working under her, knowing that her mother would have never met
any of them.  "Maya, prepare to begin synchronization with the pilots.
Run a sample pulse through the Evas in the hangar first."

The cockpit of the Eva felt oddly empty without the LCL flooding the
chamber, and Niobe couldn't help but feel a minor relief as she saw the
liquid rushing up to meet her from the bottom of the chamber.  Almost
the second she felt it touch her feet, she giggled slightly, the
slightly sticky orange-red liquid feeling somewhat nice between her
toes, a vague warmth to her that seemed to call back memories of being
in her mother's womb.  As the liquid flooded over her naked skin, the
darkness of the cockpit remaining, she felt the comparison growing more
apt, feeling amazingly relaxed simply by the fact that she was in the
cockpit, idly dreaming that she'd much rather pilot the Eva without her
plugsuit as the liquid rose to cover her breasts.

"It feels weird," announced Nieve over the radio, waiting until the
liquid had flooded her lungs to say anything, still feeling vaguely
exposed without any of her clothes on.  She knew, academically, that
none of the senior staff would be staring at her, unless Misato had
reasons she didn't know about for leaving Kaji behind.  However, it was
still somewhat eerie, sitting inside the cockpit that she'd worn a
plugsuit to as long as she could remember with nothing but her skin
being gently caressed by the blood-scented liquid.  "I mean, the
plugsuit conducts the sensation pretty well normally, but... it's
different.  It's still fabric."

"Sorry, but we need to get the harmonics results directly from your
bodies for this experiment.  That means no plugsuits this time
around."  Ritsuko paused for a moment, glancing towards Misato to make
sure that the other woman didn't want to say anything, then turning
back towards Maya.  "Maya, initialize the first synchronization
interlocks within the dummy plugs inside the Evas.  Once the interlocks
have taken hold, begin the synchronization with the pilots."  Maya
nodded, and Ritsuko turned back towards the window, unconciously
crossing her fingers.

Niobe flexed her hands gently against the smooth metal of the cockpit's
handrests, then slowly felt the touch of the Eva's mind against her own
mind, the machine feeling oddly distant, as though she was trying again
to synchronize with it for the first time.  "This feels wrong," she
noted, closing her eyes and tightening her grip on the handrests, her
cockpit remaining dark due to the simple fact that the dummies had no
visual input equipment for the cockpits.  "My Eva doesn't even seem to
be in the right place."  She paused, trying to draw the mind closer to
her, feeling her frustration grow slightly as it seemed to slip through
her mental fingers, like a fish wriggling free of her grip.  "Why do we
have to do this, anyways?"

"Our enemies are becoming more advanced, and we need to become more
advanced to match them.  Besides, this is a test primarily for your
safety."  Ritsuko felt a momentary pang of guilt through her chest,
recalling the questions that she'd felt earlier in the day, forcing the
thought out of her mind as best she could and biting her lower lip for
a second before continuing.  "You're only children - you shouldn't have
to pilot combat machines like you do.  If the dummy plug system works,
we can use the Eva units independent of you six - you can stay on the
sidelines, controlling the machines by remote or autopilot."

Hearing Ritsuko's words made Niobe feel a pang of concern once again,
her mind jumping back to Misato's harsh words to her several days
prior, the way that she'd told Niobe she could be ejected from NERV.
She'd realized then that she wasn't irreplacable, and the simple fact
of the test made Niobe feel for just a moment that she was being
considered for replacement.  Forcing the though out of her mind, she
concentrated harder on the mind of her Eva, trying to draw the
machine's consciousness closer.  "Sounds like a bad plan," she said
firmly, grimacing and beginning to sweat slightly.  "It's hard to synch
like this."

Staring at her computer console, Maya's eyes went wide, surprised at
the display relating to EVA-05's synch ratio.  "Dr. Akagi, ma'am?  You
might want to have a look at this."  Ritsuko, focused on the dummies,
lingered for a moment at the railing, only her gaze turned back towards
the younger woman.  A second or so later, she grudgingly seemed to tear
herself away, walking over to the computer console with a somewhat busy
air about her, her eyes going wide as well as she saw the display.
"EVA-05... Niobe's managed to break 45%, even with the interference and
lowered receptivity of the dummy plug."  Maya paused, then looked up
towards Ritsuko, her eyes wide, almost hungry for some kind of
acceptance.

Ritsuko nodded down towards the other woman, her mind focused on the
implications of the results.  She'd expected that Ryo would be the one
to hit normal operating standards with the dummy plugs, but if Niobe
was surpassing the boy it threw a minor wrench into her expectations,
one that she couldn't think of how to deal with right away.  Shaking
her head and focusing on the matter at hand, she leaned back towards
the microphone, glancing quickly towards Misato, certain that the other
woman had heard what she had been talking with Maya about.  "Niobe?"
she said, sounding almost hesitant.  "You're doing an excellent job.
Your synch ratio just passed 45%."

Under any other circumstances, Niobe would have been crestfallen, fully
aware that it would mean she was a fair ten points below her usual
ratio.  However, from the distance that she could feel from the mind of
her Eva, she knew that getting such a high synchronization ratio wasn't
expected, and that 45% was easily the equivalent of her normal high.
Flipping the button that she knew was still on the side of her machine,
she opened a private channel to Ryo, smiling at the boy.  "Did you hear
that?" she asked, hoping beyond hope that it made him notice her in at
least some way.  "Sounds as though I'm doing pretty well."

"Good for you," replied Ryo flatly, his tone implying absolute
indifference towards Niobe's accomplishment.  The girl felt a minor
pang of something that she couldn't quite place, and almost embarassed
she flipped off the private channel, certain that Ryo wouldn't notice
the sudden loss.  She'd been certain that it would mean something to
him that she had been doing so well, that he would be glad she was
being successful.  Instead, he'd seemed almost irritated by the
momentary distraction, as though she truly meant nothing to him.
Closing her eyes, forcing herself to remember that she just had to try
harder, she forced herself to focus through the mental intereference,
hands gripping the metal grips until her knuckles began to turn white.

Her dummy standing next to Niobe, Eiko's thoughts couldn't possibly
have been further from the Evas, still wondering what Vash had though
of her when he'd caught a glimpse of her naked, unsure of how to take
Nieve's comment.  The news that Niobe had attained the highest ratio so
quickly, however, brought her mind back to focusing on the Eva, and as
she started to try harder to synch with her Eva she felt something
tickling at the back of her mind, as though there was something
inimical to her left.  "Ritsuko?" she asked, feeling somewhat
embarassed.  "Is something wrong with Niobe's machine?"

Ritsuko cocked an eyebrow at the rather odd question, and she glanced
back towards Maya, happy to see the young woman checking on the
question without any prompting.  "Niobe?" she asked, assuming there
could be no harm in asking.  "Eiko seems to be sensing something
unusual from your machine.  We're checking it now.  Do you feel
anything wrong about it?"

Niobe felt the urge to simply blurt out a negative answer and move on,
but taking a deep breath she forced herself to remain calm, focusing on
the sensation of the machine around her, trying to see if there was
anything unusual about the sense of the golem.  Gritting her teeth as
she tried to split her focus, she began to feel something at the back
of her mind, slowly moving across her hip like black slime, the
sensation seeming painfully and disgustingly obvious once she realized
it.  "There seems to be something on my hip," she noticed, trying to
focus harder on the Eva, ignoring the sensation of something oozing
along her leg.

"There shouldn't be," Ritsuko half-growled, stepping over to Maya's
console and taking a look at the screen.  The younger woman began to
say something, but Ritsuko could see what was happening simply by
looking at the flashing display, her eyes widening slightly.  "There's
something contaminating the neural impulse from the dummy, like some
kind of cancer."  She paused for a moment, reaching up and gripping her
chin gently with one hand as she crossed the other arm across her
chest.  "But that shouldn't be.  There aren't any organic components in
the dummy, just mechanical..."

Without warning, a horrible tearing sound filled the air, and everyone
within the observation room watched as the dummy at EVA-05's position
tore free of the wires and restraints holding it in place, the water of
the tank slamming hard against the window as Ritsuko felt a profound
sense of deja vu.  For a split second, Ritsuko thought that the machine
was going to go after the control room, but it turned towards the
position of EVA-00, knocking the other Evas out of the way and lunging
towards the dummy, slamming it against the nearest wall of the hangar.
"Niobe!  What are you doing?"

"I'm not doing this!" screamed Niobe, feeling the hands of her machine
move even as she tried to force it to stop, the white mechanical
fingers of her dummy closing around the chest of Ryo's machine.  She
could remember feeling frustrated at Ryo in the back of her mind when
the machine went berserk, but she forced herself not to feel guilty,
frantically slamming the handrests back and forth as the white
machine's fingers began to break the artificial skin of Ryo's.
"Ritsuko, this isn't me!  The dummy's gone berserk!"

Ritsuko, eyes wide, turned back towards Maya immediately, the younger
woman already beginning to act and hitting a critical combination of
keys.  "Maintenance arms dispatched," she announced, obviously
struggling to remain calm as small panels in the walls of the hangar
folded away to reveal small turrets.  "Firing on the dummy Eva."  All
of the turrets, originally intended simply for maintenance work,
trained themselves on the point of the Eva where the contamination had
started, firing white beams through the water in unison.  Everyone had
expected to have a moment without any clear view of the situation, but
none of the staff members had expected to see the trademark octagonal
ripples of an AT field erupting from the dummy's hip.

Niobe was only distantly aware that they were shouting about the
Eleventh Angel within the control room, forcing herself to maintain
control over her dummy, biting down on her teeth so hard that she felt
they were near the point of snapping.  The dummy's hands continued to
push towards the entry plug within Ryo's machine, then began to slow
slightly as Niobe forced her mind outward.  "I'm the best," she hissed,
her voice raspy through gritted teeth as the LCL's salt taste became
more pronounced, Niobe forcing the dummy backwards a lone step with all
the willpower she could muster.  "You'll do what I say."

A moment early, Ritsuko wouldn't have been willing to abandon the
experiment for anything, but two things had changed - the presence of
the Angel, and the fact that all of the pilots could be ejected.  Her
mouth half-opened to speak the command, but Misato was ahead of her,
already gesturing towards the technicians.  "Eject the entry plugs!
Once they've surfaced, get all of the Children into the hallway and
seal the entrance!  Prepare to seal off this room within the next five
minutes!"

One last moment in the cockpit seemed to stretch on for eternity for
Niobe, her mind struggling against something savage and bestial at the
back of her mind, trying to force her hands forward and claw at the
chest of Ryo's machine.  Then both machines shot out their entry plugs
like rockets, the LCL bleeding off into the water as the plug bobbed to
the surface.  Niobe knew the procedure from months of training, and
without hesitation she pushed open the hatch of the plug, then dove out
of the plug into the water, feeling the cool water smoothly slide
against her bare skin for just a moment before she pushed powerfully
against it and forced herself to the landing that led to the hallway.
Pulling herself up, she saw the other Children swimming towards her,
various degrees of modesty being attempted by the group, all mercifully
within a few seconds of swimming.

"Sealing tunnel," announced Maya as the Children began to run down the
hall towards their elevators, a solid white door with the NERV insignia
slamming down and sealing off the tunnel.  The massive white dummy
seemed to stagger for a moment, as though the loss of the pilot had
some effect on it, then the beast lunged towards the window of the
control room.  A loud cracking noise rose from the glass as the thing
slammed into it, and Ritsuko fought down a rising tide of panic as she
watched spiderwebbing cracks begin to appear along the surface of the
window.  Maya stared at the beast with wide eyes for a moment, then
swallowed hard and turned back to her computer.  "Pattern is blue!
It's definitely an Angel!"

"Everyone, out of the room!" shouted Misato and Ritsuko in unison,
causing a brief moment of the women staring at one another before they
headed for the door as well.  The computers were abandoned without
question as another earth-shattering blow shook the observation room,
water beginning to trickle in from the windows, something that Ritsuko
knew to mean that the window was about to burst.  Hesitating for just a
moment, she slammed a quick sequence of commands into the computer as
the technicians rushed out, then exited as well, waiting for just a
second outside the control room for the door to hiss shut.

The doctor stared just for a moment, feeling a sense of satisfaction as
the hiss was followed by a gulping noise and the mechanical whirring of
bolts being sealed in place.  "Observation room sealed," she announced
to the assembled technicians and Misato, barely managing to keep
herself from wincing as the noise of shattering glass filled the air,
followed by the odd sucking noise of water rushing to fill a vaccuum.
Everyone else seemed to be expecting to drown, and there was almost an
air of disappointment at the fact that the hall didn't flood as well.
"Come on," announced Ritsuko firmly, turning and heading towards the
nearest elevator.  "We'll need to get to the main control room."

                                  ]++[

Ritsuko's mind was whirling in circles as the elevator seemed to crawl
upwards at a snail's pace, the light walls of the transport feeling
unbearably small, her gaze focused loosely on the door while Misato
tapped her foot nearby.  She knew that she owed the other woman some
kind of comment, some acknowledgement that they were both riding in the
same elevator, but she couldn't help but be distracted, her mind
focused entirely on the unexpected presence of the Angel in the middle
of the test.  "How could it have even gotten into the facility?" she
muttered to herself, vaguely aware that she drew a gaze from Misato but
not caring, wanting a cigarette more badly than she could express.
"Our sensors are working at full standards.  We should have detected
the pattern the second it came anywhere near Tokyo-3, even if it came
from below.  Unless the water itself -"

"How it got in isn't important," offered Misato firmly, the underlying
implication beneath her somewhat angry voice that she was simply happy
to find a point to disagree with her former friend on.  "All that
matters is the fact that it's inside now.  We've got to do something to
prevent it from reaching the lower levels."

Glaring at Misato for just a second, Ritsuko forced herself to remain
composed as the doors of the elevator slid open with their
characteristic hiss, revealing the empty control room flashing alerts
as technicians scrambled to their stations and began operating their
consoles.  "How it got in is -very- important," replied Ritsuko firmly,
making sure to step out first, not wanting Misato to be angry with her
on top of everything else that had gone wrong with the day.  "If we
can't stop this one from getting in, we don't know if we can stop any
of the others."  She stepped over towards the main screen as Makoto
slid into his chair, drumming in a quick sequence of commands and
bringing up a display of the holding bay.

Frowning, Ritsuko and Misato both stared at the main screen, the murky
water no longer serving to obscure what was happening.  EVA-05's dummy
remained in place, something that looked like mildew on its white
surface slowly creeping its way along the machine's body.  It had
already crept upwards from the leg into the midsection of the dummy,
small bits of light glinting from within the black mass as though it
was hiding some sort of coins within its depths.  "Set the Magi to
getting a better picture of what that thing is," said Ritsuko firmly,
not waiting for Misato to give the orders.  "Maya, notify the Children
to prepare for launch."

"Thank you, Ritsuko, that's -my- job," snapped Misato, drawing a harsh
stare from Ritsuko even though the blonde woman knew she was right.
There was a tense moment between the two even as the alarm sirens
wailed, but after a moment Misato simply shook her head and waved her
hands, and Maya began to prepare the Eva units for launch, draining the
nutrient bath from their hangars as Misato and Ritsuko both stared up
at the main screen together.  There was an awkward moment as Misato
frowned at the screen and half-turned her head towards the other woman,
then she sighed and looked at Ritsuko.  "The dummies didn't have any
organic components in them, did they?"

Ritsuko wanted to be petty about Misato's insistence at her authority
for just a moment, but the necessity of the situation demanded
something else, and she simply shook her head, looking up at the
growing contamination as well.  "Nothing organic in them at all."  She
paused for a moment, then glanced down at Makoto, hesitating just long
enough to make sure that Misato wasn't about to object to the address.
"Makoto, any more idea of what the Angel is?"

"As far as the sensors can tell, there isn't one Angel," replied
Makoto, his hands still flying across the controls for his console,
keying in commands with practiced ease as though he'd been working with
the machines since he was born.  "The sensors are picking up at least a
thousand tiny AT fields, and the longer we take the more they seem to
be multiplying.  From what we can tell, the only reason they were able
to generate a field strong enough to repulse the welding lasers is
because there are so many of them synchronizing their fields."

"It's a nanite colony," Ritsuko breathed, her tone vaguely reverent as
she turned her gaze back towards the main screen, still curious as to
how the Angel had managed to slip past their sensors but more amazed by
the simply fact of its existence.  "The AT fields are all parts of a
single Angel.  It's just spread out over smaller parts."  She paused
for a moment, watching the slowly-contaminating dummy lurch awkwardly
towards the control room, frowning as she watched its arm lunge towards
the screen.  "That would explain how it was able to take control of the
dummy - it must have infested the central control unit of the
machine."  Frowning, she watched the contamination spread up the
machine's arm and into the observation room.  "What could it be
planning now?"

Silence settled over the control room for just a moment, then Ritsuko
realized what was happening as the black cancer seemed to slough off
the arm of the dummy and onto one of the computer terminals, her mouth
only half-opened when the alarm sirens began to blare anew.  "We're
receiving an erroneous data signal on the Magi!" shouted Maya, the
young woman frowning as her screen began flashing an angry red.
"Something's attempting to penetrate the firewall we've set up!
There's no indication of the source of the attack!"

Ritsuko opened her mouth again, but Misato was already talking over
her, and Ritsuko scowled as she watched the other woman lunge over
towards Maya's console.  "Trace their source immediately and cut them
off.  They can't possible break through our defenses."  She paused,
then turned towards Ritsuko.  "Nobody could break through the firewall,
right?"

"Hacker has penetrated the first security level!" announced Maya, a
rising panic in her voice as the alarms continued to blare, the sounds
of the level below beginning to rise up as the assault on NERV's
supercomputers intensified.  "Source appears to be within Central
Dogma!  They're switching locations too fast - the security programs
can't cut them off!"

"Of course not.  We're being hacked by something more than human."
Ritsuko paused for a moment, then nodded towards Makoto, and the young
man began to bring up the display of the Magi's status on the main
screen, the three computers displayed as red squares linked by yellow
tethers.  She no longer needed to see the main display to know what the
Angel was trying to do.  "The Angel is penetrating our security
directly.  It's managed to bond with our internal network."  Pausing
for the barest of moments, Ritsuko let her lids flutter closed, her
mind still struggling to formulate a new plan.  "Maya, begin a full
transfer of all files on all computers within the network through the
servers.  If we're lucky, it should be enough to crash the system."

"Yes, ma'am," replied Maya firmly, a rising panic audible in the
younger woman's voice as she ran her fingers across the keyboard, sweat
beginning to bead on her forehead when her computer flashed a bright
red screen as she hit the last key.  "M-ma'am, the network is denying
us access!  All information on NERV's wide-area network is denied!"
She paused briefly, trying to draw up another connection with the Magi,
something between relief and further panic appearing as the screen
emerged.  "We're still connected to the Magi, but the first seven
security levels have been breached!"

The vaguest hints of sweat began to trickle along Ritsuko's forehead as
she glanced back and forth between the main screen and Maya's console,
mind frantically trying to process all of the information.  She knew
the Magi's capabilities inside and out, knew how well the security
system was set up, but she also knew that it had never been designed to
deal with anything of such magnitude.  Even though NERV had been built
with the intention of being capable of resisting every conceivable
attack the Angels could muster, Ritsuko was fast becoming aware of how
difficult it was to conceive what the Angels would attempt.  "Try to
sequester the Magi's local network apart from the main network," she
said, forcing herself to remain calm, knowing that panicking would do
no good.

"Network is refusing the request to sever connections!" shouted Makoto,
Ritsuko's head turning towards the young man even as his eyes went
wide, the alarm siren becoming a dull ache in the background as the red
light continued to bleed along across everything.  "The thirteenth
layer of the firewall is breached!  All attempts to seal the Angel are
failing!  Antivirus system is being subverted by the Angel - it's using
our own tools to get inside!"

"I know," muttered Ritsuko, gritting her teeth and trying to think,
shaking her head as the blaring filled the room, knowing that there had
to be some way to keep the Magi safe from the attack.  She knew that
her mother had built in some kind of failsafe just from the way that
her mother designed everything; unfortunately, she had no idea what
that failsafe was.  "Abandon the firewall.  Sever the Magi's connection
to the network manually by destroying the twelfth and seventeenth feed
lines."  She caught a stare from Maya, the younger woman's brown eyes
wide, but Ritsuko only nodded.  "The Magi won't initiate self-destruct
protocol unless they're cut from their own intranet.  They'll only
investigate."

"Connections severing!" announced Maya, grimacing slightly as she hit
the key and let the loud noise of shattering explosive bolts fill the
air, a thin red mist drifting through the control center as the plates
detached from the wall slightly below the main screen.  Ritsuko felt a
moment of relief, then her eyes widened as she saw the red box
representing the first Magi beginning to turn red from the upper-right
corner.  Maya saw the effect as well, and she turned to the monitor
with wide eyes, obviously as bewildered as Ritsuko.  "The Angel has
rerouted input through external line three!  Magi Melchior is being
infected!"

Ritsuko watched as the contamination began to spread through the
computer on the main screen, knowing that there were only a few seconds
remaining before the Angel finished its invasion of the Magi.  "Self-
destruct protocol has been requested by the Angel!" shouted Makoto, the
terror obvious just below his voice as Ritsuko watched the blue flood
through the red box until it took up cleanly half of the indicator.
"Magi voted a unanimous negative on self-destruct, but the Angel's
submitting another request!  By the time the next one comes through -"

"It'll have at least one Magi.  It's just going to keep submitting
requests until it has all three under its influence, and then it'll
blow the entire Geo-Front away in one fell swoop."  Sighing heavily,
Ritsuko gritted her teeth and closed her eyes, letting her mind focus
entirely on the problem, blocking out the noise of the alarms and the
flashing red lights.  She knew that there had to be a simple solution
to the problem, that there was some way to keep the Magi from allowing
the Angel into their depths.  Then something occured to her, and her
eyes snapped open, staring at the main screen as the second Magi,
Balthasar, began to be flooded with the blue pattern.  "Maya, submit
the code for a Magi self-diagnostic.  Makoto, change the voting
interval to the maximum of fifteen minutes.  Shigeru, start submitting
every possible procedure to the Magi's voting database."

None of the console technicians had time to hesitate enough to question
Ritsuko's orders, only enough time to key in the commands as requested
as Balthasar's display flooded with blue.  Ritsuko could see the
contamination creeping into Casper, the final of the three Magi, and
inwardly she cringed, unsure if the system would shut down in time, and
she couldn't help but bite her lower lip as she watched the blue begin
to overtake the red, the peaceful color looking somehow inimical as it
occupied half of the last bastion of defense that NERV had.  Then there
was a pause, as though the Angel had become confused, and the main
screen froze in position.  "Magi system has shut down for self-
diagnostic," announced a calm voice that Ritsuko recognized as her
mother's.

There was a very physical sense of the tension releasing within the
control room at the Magi's announcement, as though someone had just
flipped a switch that told the entire staff to relax.  "It's not a
solution," Ristuko said softly, flicking her eyes up towards the main
screen even as she hung her head, exhausted from the adrenaline of the
situation.  "The Angel is still inside the system.  We've got two hours
to figure something out, and then we're going to be right back where we
started."  Sighing, she stepped to the balcony of the control level,
staring down at the level immediately below her, the tops of the
monolithic computers visible.  "We'll have to work fast."

                                  ]++[

Misato heard the hiss of the doors behind her, her head only barely
turning towards them, her eyes moving just enough to catch the entryway
on the absolute edges of her peripheral vision.  At the back of her
mind she half-hoped and half-dreaded that it could be Kaji, but she
could tell instantly from the purple-green outfit and the thin blonde
hair that it was Neil, a light red jacket in the style of NERV's
operations uniform slung around his shoulders.  "Neil," said the woman
calmly, turning her head away from the erect Magi in front of her and
towards the young boy, her eyes flicking briefly towards the steaming
cups in his hands.  "What's going on?"

"You're in a stressful situation," replied Neil with a shrug, offering
one of the cups to Misato casually, letting the purple-haired woman
take it and stare inside at the deep brown coffee.  "I just thought
that you could use a little something."  He paused for a moment, as
though expecting the woman to say something to him, darkening slightly
as she simply looked at the cup of coffee, his head drooping.  "If you
want sugar or cream, I've got some in the pocket of the jacket."

Staring at the coffee for a moment, Misato took a deep breath, letting
the earthy aroma fill her nose, an oddly relaxing scent despite the
fact that she knew full well coffeee was anything but relaxing.  It was
a sweet gesture, she had to admit, and she found herself feeling
somewhat mad at herself for being disappointed that it had been Neil
coming through the door and not Kaji.  "That's all right," she said at
length, Neil's face showing that it took him a moment to realize she
was responding to his earlier statement.  "I take my coffee black."
She paused, then smirked and nodded towards the other cup.  "See you
got a little bit for yourself, too.  I didn't think you were supposed
to be allowed to operate the machine alone."

"Don't patronize me.  I've been brewing this stuff since first grade."
His tone was slightly harsh, but there was a good-natured undercurrent
to it, and Misato couldn't help but smile with him at the thought of a
younger Neil working a coffee machine.  "Besides, it isn't for me - I
don't like having coffee if it's not the early morning.  It's for
Ritsuko."  He paused a moment.  "I don't know her so well, so I thought
that maybe you would want to..."  His throat seemed to tighten slightly
as Misato stared at him, and he eventually gave up on the prospect of
explaining entirely, the situation obvious.

"Ritsuko and I haven't been getting along too well," replied Misato
after another moment, staring back towards the monolithic computer, a
mess of black pipes arranged impossibly in a perfect rectangle, rising
up until the unsightly innards were covered by the white case and red
top that Misato had grown accustomed to when looking at the Magi.  "But
she could probably use a little human contact in there right now.
She's never been one to say when she needs a sympathetic ear."  She
paused, her thoughts drifting back to her days in college with her
friend, then she shook her head and gestured to the almost-unnoticable
entry tunnel in the side of the computer.  "She's right inside.  Just
crawl in and talk to her."

Neil glanced towards the tunnel, simply remaining in place for a
moment, a vague nervousness creeping through his gut at the thought of
being alone with Ritsuko.  He didn't know the first thing about the
woman, and while he felt guilty about not being able to help in any way
besides coffee it was another thing entirely to try and establish a
rapport with the woman.  Closing his eyes for a half-second, he sighed,
then walked over to the tunnel, dropping down to his hands and knees
slowly, taking care not to spill the coffee as he crawled into the
forest of black pipes.  Misato watched for a moment, her own emotions
still feeling somewhat conflicted as she turned her gaze back towards
the main screen, still displaying the almost-corrupted Magi.

The inside of the computer, much to Neil's surprise, smelled of
medicine and ozone, a rather noxious combination to say the least, and
as he felt the odor assault his nose wholeheartedly he brought the
coffee closer to his nose, letting it at least dull the smell of the
computer as he crawled forward.  "Dr. Akagi?" he called, glancing to
the sides briefly as he continued forward, seeing hundreds of tiny
yellow sticky notes attached at seemingly random locations in the
corridor, a thin chicken-scratch handwriting on all of them.  Taking a
deep breath and feeling somewhat claustrophobic, Neil stared into the
depths of the tunnel, noticing a slight light from the end, beginning
to move more swiftly towards the end with the knowledge that the woman
was there.

Ritsuko, for her part, was bundled up nearly into the fetal position,
knees only barely held away from her chest, her legs balancing a small
laptop computer on them as she typed away fiercely.  A small metal saw
lay to one side along with a square section of a gray metal casing,
only a small portable reading lamp snaked around one of the more
exposed black pipes providing her with the light that she needed to
continue working.  Her eyes almost didn't catch the sight of Neil as he
crawled into the small space next to her, and it took her another
moment to register that the Third Child was there.  "Neil?" she asked,
letting her hands freeze in place over the keyboard of her laptop as
she turned towards the boy.  "What are you doing here?"

"Offering coffee," replied Neil somewhat distractedly, his eyes
focusing up on the small gray casing that Ritsuko had removed the
portion from.  Ritsuko followed his gaze and smiled bittersweetly as
she realized he was staring at the exposed gray matter of a human brain
within, the electrodes inserted into the organ's surface tracing down
to Ritsuko's laptop.  "Dr. Akagi?  Is that a..."

"Yes," replied Ritsuko calmly, her gaze remaining focused on the gray
matter for just a moment, having almost avoided it entirely since she'd
connected her computer to the organ.  "It's a clone of my mother's
brain.  She was the one who created the entire computer system that
NERV runs on, in more ways than one."  She paused briefly, letting her
eyes flick away from the brain towards the maze of black piping and
wires in front of her.  "She claimed that each of the computers was a
part of her personality - Balthasar representing her as a scientist,
Melchior as a mother, and Casper as a woman.  But I think she just
didn't like the thought that her brain in a computer didn't give it a
personality."  Taking a deep breath, she looked towards Neil, seeing
the boy look at her with wide eyes as though she'd sprouted a second
head.  "Is something wrong?"

The boy gave a quick shake of his head, blonde hair swishing somewhat
limply around his head as it moved, and Ritsuko could tell immediately
that he was covering something up.  "Not a thing," he said, trying to
sound certain, his eyes still focused intently on the gray matter of
Casper's central processing unit.  "Well... I'm just curious..."  He
paused, then sank his head slightly, looking as though he felt guilty
for distracting Ritsuko.  "Does that mean that the Magi are sentient?"

"Maybe in theory," replied Ritsuko with a shrug, flicking her eyes up
towards the brain briefly, something in her mind blocking the emotional
impact of the fact that it was her mother's brain inside the machine.
"But not in reality.  Mother knew that when she developed them - even
though she claimed that each one represented a different part of who
she was, I've never seen any evidence of it."  She paused, briefly
wondering what it would mean if the computers truly were clones of her
mother in spirit as well, the thought of being able to talk to Naoko
again at once inviting and somewhat frightening.  Then her eyes flicked
back towards Neil, pushing the more sentimental thoughts out of her
head.  "You said something about coffee?"

Neil's gaze remained blank for a moment, then memory seemed to kick in
as he offered the still-steaming cup to Ritsuko, a gesture that she
accepted gracefully, her slender fingers wrapping around the warm paper
with a smile.  "I've got cream and sugar, if you want it," he offered,
gaze turned towards the blonde woman as she shook her head and took a
sip of the bitter liquid.  "Didn't know if you'd want it or not, but I
knew that my mother always wanted it when she was working on something
big."

"She's in the research science field, isn't she?" asked Ritsuko,
provoking a somewhat surprised nod from Neil and letting a smile play
lightly across her lips.  "You and I have something in common, then.  I
remember that my mother was always trying to explain advanced data
encryption to me when I was struggling to figure out how to put written
words together in my mind."  She paused, staring at the coffee
momentarily, then looking back towards the boy.  "Were you involved
with her when she was working on her projects?"

"All the time.  She said that my father wasn't smart enough."  He
paused, leaning gently against the wall of pipes behind him.  "It was
fun, actually, working with her.  I wasn't old enough to understand
much of what was going on, but I knew that she liked having me
around... and it was one of the few ways that I got to see her."  Neil
felt a slight tightness in his throat as the last few words passed his
lips, as though he was telling Ritsuko something that he should have
kept quiet about.  "Was it like that for you, with your mother?"

Ritsuko shook her head, feeling oddly exposed from the few words that
she and Neil had exposed, as though she'd done something specifically
wrong.  "No," she said calmly, still shaking her head and turning
halfheartedly back towards the computer screen resting on her knees.
"Mother always said that she didn't trust human hands with her
projects, that for all its idisyncracies technology was more
reliable."  She paused for a moment, letting her lids flutter closed
momentarily, the smell of antiseptic from the casing holding her
mother's brain mingling with the earthy aroma of hte coffee.  "I'm
sorry, Neil, but I really ought to get back to work.  I appreciate the
gesture, though."

Neil nodded, then turned and began to crawl back out of the bowels of
the computer as Ritsuko poised her hands over the small keyboard of the
laptop, her mind frozen on personal matters.  She knew, in the back of
her head, that she had only slightly more than half an hour to finish
what she was doing, that unless she could get Casper to upload a self-
destruct program into the invading Angel and destroy it from within she
had no chance whatsoever.  It was nothing new, and the program itself
was fairly simple, something that she knew she could get written in the
time she had left.  It was thoughts of her mother that stilled her
hands centimeteres away from the smooth rows of keys in front of her,
that kept her from punching in another line of code even though she
wanted to.

For a few more moments, perhaps as long as a minute, Ritsuko continued
to stare at the keyboard, trying to force her hands forward, to
continue coding the vital bit of software.  Then she stopped and
relaxed her hands, staring up instead at her mother's brain nestled
within the gray metal casing, simply sitting their idly.  Even though
she knew it was a human brain, that it was the brain of the woman who
had given birth to her, Ritsuko hadn't allowed herself to feel anything
about it, treating it as just another interface to a computer.  As
though for the first time, she took a deep breath and let the reality
of the situation register, let her mind take in the fact that she was
tampering with Naoko's brain.

"But it isn't really her brain," she muttered after a moment, flicking
her eyes away from the small piece of gray matter towards the maze of
black pipes that formed the floor of the chamber.  "It's just a part of
a computer that happens to come from a human.  It might as well be an
interface port."  She glanced up at the brain once again, her mind
drifting back to earlier in the day as the dummy plug tests had begun,
the uncharacteristic feelings of doubt she'd had about attempting to
duplicate the Children with computers.

"Mother was just replacing humans with technology," she whispered,
turning her gaze back towards the keyboard resting on her knees, motion
beginning to return to her hands as she perched them over the rows.
"And now I'm doing the same thing."  The thought brought a bittersweet
smile to her lips even at the same moment that she felt like shedding a
tear, and both thoughts were pushed out of her head as she resumed her
typing.

                                  ]++[

If Niobe had been able to wear a watch at the same time that she wore
her plugsuit, she would have been happy to.  As it was, she could only
flick her blue eyes back towards the clock on the wall every few
seconds, the rest of the time spent watching as the technicians
scurried about on the lowest level of the command room, the main screen
now darkened and looming above everything as the tension continued to
hover through the air.  "This is horrible," she muttered to herself,
unsure if she was referring to the fact that an Angel had managed to
infiltrate Central Dogma or the fact that she couldn't possibly have
anything to do with the beats's repulsion.  "This is absolutely
horrible."

"Got that right."  The voice was recognizable, and Niobe only afforded
the briefest of glances over her shoulder from her small chair towards
the door that led after some small windings to the Eva hangars,
catching just enough of the purple and black plugsuit to know that it
was Vash speaking to her before she turned her head back towards the
massive main screen.  She had no interest in talking with the boy, but
he seemed to have other ideas on the matter as he walked over to her.
"I mean, bad enough that Tokyo-3 is under another Angel attack, but
this time they don't even get to see the glorious form of their savior
Vash Nekasa."  He leaned over, shoving his face almost directly into
Niobe's.  "The people could despair."

Niobe reached up rather casually, letting her hand firmly close around
Vash's chin before shoving the boy out of her face, the yellow of her
plugsuit almost matching the light color of his hair.  Vash faked being
hurt for a moment, then sat down directly next to Niobe, flicking his
eyes with her as she glanced up at the clock, then towards the main
screen, then simply smiling as she looked towards him with an irate
expression on her face.  "Was I somehow unclear about my feelings on
talking with you?" she asked, resisting the urge to simply smack the
boy.

Vash shrugged, then leaned back in his seat, his lips curled into a
sort of half-smirk, arms folded behind his head and a sort of innocent
joy in his eyes.  The posture itself was the apotheosis of laziness,
something that almost inadvertantly sent tremors of resentment up and
down Niobe's spine.  "I got that you didn't want to talk to me.  I'm
just kind of lonely."  He shrugged again, apparently unconcerned with
the utter revulsion that Niobe was staring at him with.  "Most of the
others are having lunch in the lounge, since there isn't much to do
here.  And Ryo... well, I haven't tried to talk to Ryo."  Another
shrug.  "Besides, you and I have never really, y'know, talked."

"And you've never stopped to consider the fact that there might be a
reason for that," replied Niobe rather harshly, her eyes fluttering
closed at the mention of Ryo, thoughts jumping back to how she'd lost
another chance to make him notice her at the same time that she'd
disappointed Joseph.  "I'm not concerned about making friends here,
Vash.  All I want to do is be the best pilot there is, and destroy the
Angels while I'm at it."

"Yeah, I've noticed that," replied Vash casually, drawing the girl's
attention back towards him, his smirk having turned slightly more
bittersweet as he stared up at the monolithic screen in front of them.
"Awfully narrow view to have.  After all, even if you don't much care
for me - and while that in and of itself ought to be a criminal
offense, I'm not going to force the point - the people who make your
life important are all working here."  He paused briefly, then tilted
his head towards the girl.  "You're rooming with Ayanami, aren't you?
Haven't you been able to make the boy warm up to you after all this
time?"

The words filled Niobe with both a deep sense of failure and a creeping
terror that Vash knew something that she didn't, that somehow the
irresponsible boy in front of her had managed to get Ryo to finally
open up a little bit.  It was an unpleasant thought to say the least.
"I'm not prying into your personal life," she said curtly, folding her
arms across her chest firmly, turning her head away with a slight swish
of her hair.  "I would appreciate it if you extend the same courtesy to
me."

"Fair enough," replied Vash with a shrug, letting the subject drop with
a metaphorical dull thump.  Silence settled between the two as a few
minutes passed, the tan-suited technicians preparing for the
reactivation of the Magi, the upload of a self-destruct program into
the Angel prepared.  "I've gotta say, though, this has been the most
boring Angel ever.  Two hours, it's just sat and done nothing.  I mean,
it's supposed to be locked into NERV's central network, right?  You'd
think at the very least it would mess with our heads, open and close
doors at random, stuff like that.  It hardly needs the Magi to cause
mayhem."

Something about the boy's words set off a spark in Niobe's mind, the
concept of the Angel's inactivity sticking with her like a virus.
Closing her eyes for only a moment, she suddenly took a sharp breath
inward as she came to a conclusion, then lurched out of her chair and
began running for the door, her footfalls a soft slapping noise against
the metal floor, mind ignoring Vash calling out to her.  She knew that
she had to get to the Eva hangar quickly, that she might have an
opportunity to go into combat with the Angel yet.

On the main floor of the control room, Ritsuko simple leaned over the
absolute edge of the platform, her eyes focused on the red tops of the
three Magi, trying to resist the urge to think about the fact that
there was an Angel attempting to take the computers over.  It was all
she could do to remain calm as she heard the steady noise of the clock
ticking down, the Magi running themselves through the last few stages
of their diagnostic, Commander Ikari sitting silently on the upper
level as though there was nothing the Angel could do to shake his
resolve.  Then a massive dinging noise echoed through the control
chamber, and Ritsuko let her eyes flutter shut for just a moment, her
mind drifting as she pushed away from the edge.  "It starts," she said
softly, knowing that there was still a second left before the invasion
was renewed.

Without hesitation, the red lights of the room snapped on with a
vengeance, and the room was filled with the blaring of alarm sirens,
Ritsuko's hands twitcing slightly as she saw the Magi displayed on the
main screen once again.  "Uploading self-destruct program from Magi
Casper!" announced Maya proudly, her hands flying across the keyboard
with practiced grace even as the blue contamination continued to flood
through the last computer with astonishing grace.  "Program invading
the Angel's neural network in five... four... three... two... one...
now!"

A single moment seemed to stretch on into eternity as Maya's light
voice announced the activation of the self-destruct program into the
Angel's consciousness, only the last sliver of Casper's display
remaining red, the Angel's signature blue flooding every other corner
of the display.  For a second, nobody could know if the Angel had
actually been taken by the self-destruct program, if Ritsuko's last
gambit had succeeded or not.  That second was agony for the blonde
woman, eyes wide and fixed on the display, all her hopes focusing
themselves on the display as a single spot continued to shine red.
Then there was another dinging noise, and the blue flood seemed to seep
out as though it was water, the red flooding the displays once more.
"We did it," she whispered, letting herself collapse forward onto the
railing above the Magi.  "The Angel is neutralized."

"Negative!" shouted Makoto, drawing Ritsuko's attention towards him as
a thin layer of sweat seemed to erupt from her forehead.  "We're still
detecting a blue pattern in Feed Line 13... it's spreading out on this
level!"  He paused for a moment, bringing up a display of a darkened
room that was filled with vaguely massive objects, the black glinting
of the Angel becoming visible against what seemed to be a wall.
"Breach through Chamber 16!  It's going somewhere else!"

Down in the Eva hangar, Niobe could hear the radio from the entry plug,
and even though she knew that she couldn't deploy the Eva on her own
she could still make the commanders listen.  "The Angel is heading
towards another means of destroying the base!" she shouted, hoping that
the external feed on her communicator was still connected, knowing
logically that it should be but still feeling the vaguest hints of
apprehension about it.  "It had two hours while the Magi ran their
diagnostic to try and find alternative methods for destroying our
base.  There's got to be something in Chamber 16 that it could use to
destroy Central Dogma."

"Jet Alone," announced Gendou calmly, drawing the gazes of everyone
within the control room up towards the highest level, the commander's
gaze dispassionated with his white-gloved hands tented in front of his
mouth.  "After the war games, the unit was stationed here in the Eva
storage chamber - number sixteen.  The nuclear reactor within could
conceivably serve as an explosive, certainly enough to destroy the vast
majority of our capabilities."  He paused for a moment, letting his
words sink in.  "Launch EVA-05 and direct it towards Chamber 16.  The
Angel must be prevented from its alternative method."

Although she was fully aware of the gravity of the situation, Niobe had
to force herself to repress a small exclamation of triumph as the entry
plug began to lurch towards her Eva, the confirmation of her theory
borne out.  Vash's comment has set her mind in motion, and now she was
the lone pilot sent in against the Angel.  If she didn't manage to earn
some notice from Ryo afterwards, she would be profoundly surprised.
The plug lurched as the plug slid into the back, mechanical noises
surrounding her as the machine accepted its pilot.  "Any idea of how I
could destroy this thing?" she asked almost idly, waiting for just a
moment before the familiar sensation of the sticky LCL began to creep
around her ankles.

"Neutralizing its AT field might break up the colony's cohesion,"
replied Ritsuko, still amazed that she hadn't thought to try and put
some kind of safeguard around other possible locations of the Angel,
angry for not having thought of the fact that the colony could behave
like something other than a single entity.  "The Eva storage room is
near the launch pads.  We're opening the doors for you - all you've got
to do is get in there and destroy the Angel."  She paused, in the back
of her mind wishing that it was Ryo inside the cockpit instead of
Niobe, knowing that the boy was more machine-like and efficient.
"You're all that we've got."

"I know," replied Niobe, smirking to herself as the external cameras
came on-line, her Eva moving out of the hangar even as she glanced down
towards one end of the long row of launch pads.  The doors to the
storage chamber were opening with a massive creaking noise, and Niobe
took a single deep breath before rushing her machine towards the oddly
inviting blackness, letting the Eva's AT field embrace her as she ran
past the vertical launch rails towards the vaguely-defined room in
front of her.  Without a pause, she deployed the prog knife from her
left shoulder and drew it forth with her right hand, feeling the weapon
rest anxiously in one hand as her machine took a step into the darkness.

The instant the machine's massive yellow foot slammed to the ground,
the fluorescent lights of the room seemed to flicker on, the massive
room a teal-gray junk room for what appeared to be every extremely
specialized weapon within NERV's arsenal.  Her breaths coming heavy,
Niobe let her gaze roam over the various shapes for a moment before she
saw the slumped form of Jet Alone, the white robot slowly becoming
stained with the glittering blackness of the Eleventh Angel, then
slowly beginning to move to its feet.  "I won't fail," the girl hissed,
her hands tightening around the handrests as she lunged towards the
robot, knowing that this time it would have no trouble generating an AT
field.

Certainly enough, the machine reached a single angry hand towards Niobe
as soon as she had come within its reach, letting the clawlike grip
latch onto one shoulder flange and try to pull her closer as the
octagonal ripples dissipated into nothingness.  Forcing herself to
focus, Niobe took a deep breath of the salty LCL and jettisoned the
shoulder flange, feeling a small twitch of pain in her Eva's shoulder
but taking some small pleasure in watching the Angel tug only to return
with nothing.  "I'm not going to let you destroy this base," she hissed
quietly, driving the point of her prog knife into the chest of the
machine, watching as the metal bent and then split under the pressure.
"Because I'm the best."

Ritsuko wondered for just an instant if the girl had gone insane as she
watched the yellow Eva rip a hole into the front of the nuclear-powered
machine, some small terror rising that the girl would cause exactly
what NERV was afraid of.  Then she watched as Niobe drew the prog knife
back out, letting the weapon clatter to the floor and instead forcing
the fingers of her Eva inside of the crack, her grip tightening.
"She's trying to force out the reactor," muttered Ritsuko, glancing
towards Maya's display of the girl's synchronization ratio, noticing
that it was still holding steady at her normal rate.  "Is EVA-05 even
strong enough to do that?"

Niobe could only distantly hear the sound of Ritsuko's voice as she
forced her hands to tear a wider opening in the other machine's chest
armor, her arm muscles flexing as the whitewashed metal split and
pulled away.  Her hands closed around what she knew to be the reactor,
and feeling Jet Alone begin to dig in its heels she forced the reactor
backwards, placing all of her force behind the effort, feeling the
metal beneath her Eva's fingers resist the push.  A second later,
almost as though it was an afterthought, she felt a growing pressure
around her neck, and as she heard the clang of a discarded shoulder
unit she realized that the robot was strangling her, the pressure on
her throat growing intensely.

Gritting her teeth, Niobe pushed forward with all the force that her
will could muster, the sharp and remorseless fingers of Jet Alone
closing tighter and tighter around her neck, both machines locked in an
embrace of death.  Niobe could feel her vision begin to blur, could
taste either blood or LCL on her lips as she continued to push, her
body aching and crying for relief.  For the barest of moments, she
wanted to stop, to figure out another plan, to request backup, anything
to stop the crushing pressure around her neck.  It felt as though the
LCL in her throat was slowly reverting back to water, the thick
sensation of liquid in her lungs screaming through her brain.

Then she thought of Ryo and her father, thought of what it meant about
her if she wasn't capable of disabling a simple machine that was less
powerful than hers.  A flaming trail of pain shot up both of her arms
as she pushed the Eva's muscles harder, gritting her teeth and forcing
herself to see clearly through the haze of pain coming from the claws
clutching at her neck.  The LCL clogged in her half-crushed throat, her
fingers felt as though they bled, and she continued to force as much
pressure as she possibly could on the nuclear reactor, forcing it
forward with all of the energy that she could muster, her mind fixated
solely on the picture of her father.  "I will be the best," she
snarled, mind distantly aware that her voice was now a raspy hiss.  "I
will be the best.  I -have- to be!"

Had Niobe been able to see the main screen in NERV's control room, she
would have seen the sudden flare of light from the four optics on the
head of her Eva, the sudden and unexpected way that her Eva's head
seemed to shift formation ever so slightly as the lenses flared a bright
white.  As it stood, she only could see the reactor in front of her
start to blur as she forced all of the weight of her Eva behind the
single push, every muscle in her body screamin for release as the
pressure on her throat grew too great, the flow of oxygen stopping for
one critical instant.  She didn't even notice, fingers wrapped tightly
around the handrests and forcing them forward as far as they would go,
knuckles bone-white beneath the yellow and brown of the plugsuit.  A
tearing noise was filling the cavernous storage room, but even that
input was cut out of her mind, her entire existence focused on putting
all the strength she could behind the push, even as she felt the black
fingers of unconsciousness begin to wrap around her mind.

With a last choking would-be scream that wound up being nothing but a
gurgle, Niobe offered one last shove, then her eyes brightened as she
felt the generator give in, the stressed metal of Jet Alone finally
giving way as the generator forced hard against its back, ripping out
as Niobe drove her machine forward and the grip around her neck
relaxed.  The entire nuclear assembly burst out from the white robot's
back like some demented child, black glittering vaguely visible on it
as she thrust it outwards and released it, letting it crash against the
nearest wall as though it was a child's toy.  The pain of the
strangulation had faded from her neck, but the LCL still tasted sharply
like blood, and without further hesitation Niobe reached up to the head
of the Angel-infested Jet Alone, forcing one hand firmly into the
central processor of the unit as the other grabbed one of the robot's
arms and ripped it out.

In the command center, there was still a hovering moment of panic, the
assembled staff all still wondering if the reactor was going to go
critical, if the Angel could still turn the robot into a nuclear bomb.
Then a thin smile crept across Makoto's lips as he hunched over his
console, and Ritsuko felt her entire body go limp with relief, the
adrenaline draining from her system almost immediately.  "Scanners are
no longer detecting a blue pattern within the base.  Eleventh Angel has
been neutralized."  He paused for a moment, glancing up as Niobe
happily shoved the deceased robot into the same wall as its generator,
the flare gone from the golem's eyes.  "There's been a minor leak in
the reactor, but nothing that the Eva can't handle.  We're dispatching
a cleanup team to perform a full cleansing of the area to avoid any
nuclear contamination."

Makoto continued talking, but Ritsuko wasn't particularly paying
attention, something that she knew was unusual for her.  She glanced
over towards Misato, gesturing towards the microphone, and the purple-
haired woman only nodded, understanding Ritsuko's intentions without
further demonstration.  Turning back around, Ritsuko leaned over to the
microphone, flicking her eyes only briefly up to Niobe's Eva standing
silently over the carcass of Jet Alone.  "Well done, Niobe.  I'm
impressed."

"Doesn't matter," hissed Niobe, quietly enough that she knew Ritsuko
wouldn't be able to hear her, her breath continuing to come in short,
ragged bursts.  Staring down at the broken wreckage of Jet Alone and
feeling the red marks still gracing her neck from the strangulation,
she knew that she should have performed better, that she should have
figured out some way to break free from the robot's grip.  She knew
that Ryo would notice her after what she'd done - she believed that
with all her heart - but she also knew that Joseph would be upset that
she'd performed poorly enough for the Angel to get a hand on her.
Sighing, she let her eyelids flutter closed, letting herself simply
bask in the smooth motion of the LCL around her body.  "I apperciate
it, Ritsuko," she lied, feeling her muscles slowly wind down.  "I'm
pleased with what I've done, too."

                                  ]++[

Outro: Neon Epoch Evangelion is based off of -Shin Seiki Evangelion- by
GAINAX and company.  It is not intended to be a straightforward fanfic,
but it is building off the work of others, and as such it is done with
the utmost respect for the original works and their authors.
Basically, even though this is an original work, it's based off the
work of others, and if you read this, you should go to see the original.

Special thanks to all of the real Children - you know who you are.

Extra special thanks to Joe Augulis for his consultation on the
Japanese portions of the story.  He might not know much Japanese, but
that's more than I know.

Copyright 2002 Eliot Lefebvre.

NEXT EPISODE:
             No need to close your eyes.
             No need to stop your breath.
             No need to hold your heart.
NEON EPOCH EVANGELION 15: RESTING HERE WITH ME
"I want to do this with you, Neil.  I really do."

                                  ]++[

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