From: eltf@hotmail.com (Eliot Lefebvre)
Subject: [Eva][FanFic] Neon Epoch Evangelion: Episode 18
X-Original-Date: 16 Dec 2002 05:54:43 -0800

I want you to join the mercenary unit "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.

Okay, folks - as warned, there will be a lag in NEE's posting.  Next
week, there will be -no- episode posted.  Really.  Nothing, nada,
zilch, zero, zip.  Don't go looking for it, it won't be there.  I'll be
back home and devoid of Internet access, so it'll be conspicuously
absent.  There will - hopefully - be a new episode of the series up two
weeks from today, but in the worst-case scenario one will get posted on
the 6th or so of January.  Sorry, but there's really nothing I can do
about it.

On the other hand, there -will- be some special fiction posted to
http://www.lostfactor.net on Friday as an early Christmas gift... but
it's not NEE.  (The temptation to do the Tokyo-3 Christmas Special has
thankfully been repressed.)  Still, you might enjoy it - it does
involve lots of gunfights.

                                  ]++[

               ]+ ELECTRONIC TRANSCENDENCE PRODUCTIONS +[
                                presents

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

                  ]+ EPISODE 18:  DREAD COUNTENANCE +[

                     By Eliot "Lostfactor" Lefebvre

             Based off of "Shin Seiki Evangelion" by GAINAX

                                  ]++[

His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes
were like blazing fire.
- REVELATIONS 1:14

                                  ]++[

Misato's hand gently touched the white bandage wrapped about her head,
strips of gauze wrapping around her skull and just barely managing to
avoid covering her eyes, her fingertips coming back without blood on
them as a minor relief.  She could remember when she had been found by
the rescue party, how she'd been pronounced "fine" over the radio as
soon as it was seen that she could walk and that she was entirely aware
of her surroundings and circumstances.  The horribly loud noise of the
helicopter's rotors and the bandage patching up the wound on the back
of her head, however, spoke less to the initial assessment and more to
the fact that she was not fine at all.

Her eyes flicked across the passenger chamber of the helicopter towards
Ritsuko, the woman asleep, her left arm cradled in a sling with the
tips of a splint protruding from it.  They had, from what the rescue
squad said, been among the lucky ones, on the absolute edge of the
blast radius when the Angel had first attacked, spared anything but the
weakest of blows.  That blow alone had been more than enough to tear
apart the observation station and send she and Ritsuko tumbling along
the ground for at least ten meters, and she had known enough of what
had happened to realize that the lucky ones were about the only ones
that would escape without being dead or permanently disabled.  Of
course, she would argue that the truly lucky ones were the technicians
that had been in a similar situation, as they didn't have to be air-
lifted back to Central Dogma immediately.

"We never really thought about it," she muttered to herself, turning
her head to stare out the window at the trail of destruction that the
Angel had left.  Crews were already hard at work trying their best to
clean up the devestation, a task that they were poorly equipped for in
light of the destruction the beast had wrought.  "We always just
assumed that we'd be inside of the Geo-Front when an Angel attacked.
We thought that the armor would be enough, that we could lock ourselves
away from danger."  She paused, flicking her gaze towards Ritsuko,
wishing momentarily that she had a conscious audience at the very
least.  "That's what we get for trusting technology with our lives."

A beep came from beside her, and Misato glanced down at the unfamiliar
cellular phone, its screen flashing that she was being contacted.  Her
own phone had gone largely unused except in emergencies, but it had
been more than crushed in the explosion, and so one of the field staff
had provided her with a new one until she was able to request another
from Commander Ikari.  She'd not been informed that anyone would have
the number, although she supposed that it could have someone for the
technician.  Shrugging, she flicked the phone on and lifted the gauze
around the nearest ear, putting the phone against it.  "Major Misato
Katsuragi speaking."

"It's good to hear your voice again, Major," replied Makoto, his voice
slightly distorted by the static of the phone but still recognizable.
On the other side of the helicopter, Ritsuko stirred slightly from the
noise, awakened by the sounds of voices.

Misato briefly considered trying to let her friend get more rest, but
she knew that the top priority was to get a clear picture of what had
happened against the Angel.  "Makoto.  God, it's good to hear your
voice."  She paused, biting her lip, resisting the urge to cry as she
realized it was the second time that an Angel had nearly killed her,
that she'd been saved only by pure luck this time instead of her
father's naturally paranoid tendencies.  "We're on our way to Central
Dogma.  The crew said that the Thirteenth had been engaged when they
found us.  What's the situation?"

"Um... the Thirteenth was destroyed slightly after we heard the news
about your safety," replied Makoto, an awkward stutter in his voice
letting Misato know that something was wrong, something she didn't want
to talk to him about.  "EVA-00 and EVA-05 were damaged in the battle."
He paused again, and Misato could hear the young man swallowing hard.
"Neil... EVA-01 destroyed EVA-03.  It's gone.  Over the Henflick Limit
by several thousand orders of magnitude, and even if it wasn't I doubt
we'd be allowed to repair a former Angel."

"There's something you're not telling me," said Misato flatly, crossing
her legs as best she could with the myriad scrapes and bruises along
them, further keepsakes of her battle with the Angel that hadn't
merited the same level of attention as the wound on her head.  "What
else happened with the Angel?"

Again, Makoto could be heard swallowing hard in the background,
obviously doing his best to skirt the issue, giving Misato the barest
idea of what he might be hiding.  "We... we tried to eject the pilot
from EVA-03, but we weren't able to.  The Angel held in the entry
plug."  He paused for a moment, taking a deep breath.  "During... after
the battle, EVA-01 took the entry plug and..."  There was silence.  "He
crushed it.  Like a bug."

Misato was stunned into silence, her mouth trying to move in reaction
but doing nothing but mouthing at the air uselessly.  At length she
shook her head, the beat of the rotors outside seeming to grow louder,
her eyes flicking briefly back out the window towards the nightmarish
carnage that the Thirteenth had left in its wake.  "How..."  She
paused, then tried again, struggling to wrap her mind around the news.
"Is Vash alive?"

"Barely," replied Makoto weakly.  "The Eva isn't meant to take on human-
sized opponents, and the entry plug was designed to be crush-resistant,
after all.  But between the damage from Neil's... -thorough-
destruction of Vash's Eva, the neural feedback caused by the takeover
by the Angel, and being crushed and discarded... he's in a bad way."
He paused, then sighed loud enough for the phone to pick it up.  "The
doctors are doing everything they can, but he might lose his left arm,
and at the moment it looks like he might not walk again."

"Christ almighty," muttered Misato, flicking her eyes towards Ritsuko,
seeing the concern on the other woman's face.  She momentarily wondered
if it was the right time to let the other woman know what was going on,
but with a quick roll of her eyes she realized that Ritsuko would
probably handle it better than she had.  "Hold on a second, Makoto."
Taking a deep breath, she moved the phone down, pressing it against her
chest, feeling another bruise that she was glad the rescue team hadn't
felt for as she stared into Ritsuko's blue-gray eyes.  "The Thirteenth
was neutralized.  EVA-03's entry plug got crushed."

True to form, Ritsuko barely batted an eyelid at the news, apparently
unworried by the statement.  Misato couldn't help but be a little angry
at the woman's cavalier attitude, thinking of what it must have been
like for Vash inside the sea of blood-scented LCL, wondering if it had
been anything like Neil's experience.  "Is he alive?" asked Ritsuko
flatly, forcing herself back into a sitting position with her good arm,
obviously resentful of her own frailty.

"At the moment," replied Misato, suddenly losing all desire to continue
talking to her former friend, bringing the cell phone back to her ear
and flicking her eyes back out to the scar of dirt and ice that
stretched across the landscape.  "Sorry.  Ritsuko just woke up."  She
paused, unsure of which of the Children to ask more about first,
wondering about Neil even as she felt a minor pang of regret for not
being more concerned with Vash.  "Has EVA-01 been recovered yet?"

"We're working on it.  The machine..."  A pause came from the other
end, the same as before, as though Makoto was hiding something from
Misato.  "We think the machine -might- have gone berserk.  It's hard to
say, though.  We lost all contact within the machine, but it didn't
seem about to berserk when it shut off from us..."  He paused, sighing
heavily, and Misato felt an almost tangible sense of disorientation, of
being shoved into the middle of the situation without any understanding
of what was going on.  "Everyone's wondering if Neil crushed the plug
intentionally or not.  Nobody wants to think that he did, but from what
little information we have..."

"I understand," Misato interjected, feeling in the back of her mind
that there were no two ways about the problem, that the day had already
been too horrific for the best-case scenario to have any chance of
holding up.  And she knew, as well, that she didn't want to deal with
it, that she wanted to be able to fly back pretending that everything
would be fine, that she could go home to her little surrogate family
without any crisis.  It was the first time in a long while that she
found herself truly missing the arms of a lover, that all she really
wanted was someone to hold her and console her instead of being forced
to console others.  "Fill me in when I get there.  Hopefully, EVA-01
will be back in the docks by then."

Before Makoto could say another word, Misato let her thumb press
against the button to end the call, hearing an approving chirp from the
phone to let her know that it had terminated the connection.  Sighing,
she flicked her eyes quickly over to Ritsuko, then placed the phone
down on the slightly-padded bench of the helicopter as she turned back
towards the gash in the landscape, technicians and vehicles visible
about it like flies swarming to an open wound.  Though she knew that
she didn't have the whole story about the battle with the Thirteenth
Angel, she already wasn't looking forward to eventually dealing with
it, and more than anything she wanted to simply turn the helicopter
away towards a destination with less emotional investment.  Another
sigh passed her lips as she let herself focus on the steady beat of the
rotors above her, the even and reliable noise as they cut throught the
air.

Then the phone rang again, and Misato jumped slightly, her eyes
flicking away from the window towards the small phone immediately.  She
paused for a second, letting it ring again, terrified and excited at
the thought that it was Makoto calling again with more news, news that
she knew could neither be good nor bad.  Closing her eyes momentarily,
she reached out and grabbed the phone, flicking it open with her thumb
and pressing it to her ear.  "Major Misato Katsuragi speaking," she
said, aware that her voice had a vague tremor in it now.

"Misato, thank God.  I thought that one of the morons in the tech
center had given me the wrong number for a second."  Nieve's voice hit
Misato unexpectedly, and for a second she flicked her eyes back towards
Ritsuko before she recognized the girl's tone.  "I was trying to reach
you before, but I kept getting a busy signal."

"I was on the phone with Makoto," replied Misato, her mind slowly
processing the fact that the girl couldn't possibly be doing well under
the circumstances.  For the barest of moments, she paused and let
herself entertain the fantasy that the girl had called her as a sort of
surrogate mother, that she wanted to hear Misato's voice again to know
that everything was going to be all right.  "What's happening down
there right now?  Are you all right?"

"Fine," replied Nieve, her voice giving her away.  "I'm a little wet
and bruised from the hail, but I'm entirely healthy."  She paused, and
Misato knew that the girl was going to ask her something, adding some
minor fuel to the woman's slightly-guilty fantasy.  "Misato... when
Neil is recovered in the Eva, you're going to be going in to see him.
I... I want to come, too.  Eiko and I both want to come with you."

"I see," replied Misato, speaking more as a stalling tactic than
anything else.  She was almost certain that Nieve wouldn't feel any
better if she was there, that it might actually make the girl's
situation much worse, but she also didn't want for the girl to be lying
in terrified wait.  She knew what that was like, knew that it wasn't
fair to Nieve to make her go through it.  "Are you sure that's a good
idea?  You might not like what you find out."

Nieve's voice was silent for a moment, and Misato suddenly had the
sense that the young girl was planning something very different than
what Misato had originally envisioned.  "I need to be there, Misato.
I... I just have to."  She paused, the sound of an intake of breath
cutting through the phone's static and then petering out, as though
she'd given up on the effort.

Sighing, Misato shook her head, knowing that the girl wanted to believe
that Neil hadn't done anything wrong.  It was something she was dealing
with personally, but the urge to believe was tempered by the
apprehension of the consequences if she was wrong, and despite herself
something told her that she was wrong despite everything.  "All right,"
she said, knowing that her voice was giving her away, in no state to
try and mask her emotions.  "We'll all go down to EVA-01's hangar
together."  She paused.  "Take care of yourself, Nieve."

The phone clicked off without an answer, and Misato sighed, her eyes
somehow drawn back to the devestated strip of land left by the Angel,
as though in the wake of everything else it was perverted into a
comfortingly stable feature.  To say that it was disturbing would have
been understating the situation, but Misato still let her eyes rest on
it, even as she noticed Ritsuko moving out of the corner of her eye.
"You're trying to believe in him, aren't you?" she asked softly, the
barest hints of an emotion creeping into her voice but masking
themselves too well to be identifiable.

"Would you rather we gave up on all of them?" replied Misato, her voice
harsher than she'd intended, slapping Ritsuko into silence.  Misato let
her gaze creep slightly towards Ritsuko to see the woman remaining
completely silent, then she sighed and let her eyes fall back to the
gash of land, her heart heavy with the weight of her circumstances.

                                  ]++[

Neil's memories were groggy as he felt the Eva move towards the hangar,
his video feed shut off, the LCL tasting more sharply than ever of the
unique salt of blood, his hands clenched in tight fists as he stared at
the blackness of his monitors.  In the back of his mind, he felt the
nagging question of whether or not he was truly groggy or not, whether
or not he simply wanted to be unable to remember what he had done
because it made it wasier to live with what he had done.  But those
thoughts were being pushed from his head as soon as he became conscious
of them, his entire mental ability being focused on the steady rush of
LCL in and out of his lungs, the dim orange swirls about his emerald
eyes.

Though Misato had no way of seeing Neil's eyes, she would have argued
that there was a disturbing amount of versimilitude between his eyes
and the flashing look on Nieve's eyes, focused on the machine as it
slowly moved into the hangar, demonic armor streaked with the blood of
EVA-03.  She was obviously trying to look strong, standing further
forward than Misato or Eiko, as though she was trying to intimidate the
massive machine while the teal-gray walls closed in around them.  "Are
you sure you're all right, Nieve?" asked Misato, her voice soft,
something in the back of her mind and the bottom of her heart making
her painfully aware that what was about to happen would not be good.

"I'm fine," Nieve lied, staring at the Eva as it lurched to a halt, the
restraints beginning to snap shut around it, a fitting gesture after
the savage display it had made on the surface.  She was resisting tears
with all her strength, forcing herself to remain in control even as it
tore her apart from within, knowing that it would do no good to cry as
the jets of the nutrient bath began to activate.  Her course was set,
her thoughts reconciled, and she knew that if she simply said it to
herself enough times she would more than believe it.  "I just need to
see him."

Silence reigned over the voices for a moment, the only noise that of
the nutrient bath swirling loosely about the bottoms of EVA-01's feet.
Then there came the distinctive noise of the Eva's back hinging open as
the entry plug slid out, a crane retrieving the plug as it flushed out
the LCL and the back of the machine closed once again.  A few more
restraints slid into place around the Eva as the entry plug swung
towards the catwalk slowly, agonizingly slowly, finally setting down
after what seemed like an eternity.

Neil reached up and gently pushed the hatch of the plug open, knowing
full well that it would not be enough to open the hatch.  He couldn't
know for certain what awaited him outside of the plug, but a hissing
voice in the back of his mind warned him that it would be bad.  The
hatch, unsurprisingly, remained shut, and for a moment he considered
remaining within the plug, simply waiting for the next time that NERV
decided he was necessary.  Gritting his teeth, he pushed again, letting
the hatch swing open, the fluorescent light from the teal-gray hangar
flooding in like a cold bath.

A moment passed before Neil found the strength to climb out of the
plug, the sheer impact of the situation not lost on him as he stepped
out onto the catwalk, Misato, Nieve, and Eiko all assembled before
him.  All four remained quiet as the plug closed again and was moved
off of the catwalk, LCL dripping slowly from the boy's body and
sloughing down into the nutrient bath harmlessly.  His vocal cords felt
choked by the blood-liquid that he had sat in, and something from his
memory tugged at his heart, tried to leap from his mouth into the open
air even as he tried to rein it in.

"You destroyed the Thirteenth Angel," Misato said at length, unable to
wait any longer, wanting to know the horrible truth right away instead
of letting it simply hang in the air.  The boy stared for a moment,
then nodded weakly, some unimaginable hurt showing behind his eyes,
only serving to deepen Misato's unspeakable terror about what she would
learn about him.  "Nobody's even confused about that.  But you crushed
the entry plug afterwards, after you'd disemboweled the machine.  Why?"

"I didn't," replied Neil, his voice sounding oddly hollow and
shellshocked, devoid of any of the emotion that any of the assembled
people knew to expect from him.  He wanted to frown, to feel angry,
sad, happy, perturbed, frustrated, something other than simply blank,
but something was keeping him from it, keeping him from being convinced
by his own words.  "I lost control of the Eva.  It crushed Vash's plug
without me."  He knew that his voice should sound something other than
emotionless.  He should be sad.  Why couldn't he feel sad?  "Is he all
right?"

Nieve stepped forward before anyone could say anything, her motions
slow and awkward, feet falling irregularly and causing her path to sway
gently from side to side as she approached the boy.  His eyes fixed
blankly on hers, and had Misato been able to see her eyes she would
have seen the same thing on her face, not that she doubted it was there
regardless.  Moments passed this way, her steps bringing her within
arm's length of Neil, and everyone seemed to hold their breaths as
Nieve reached out her arm, letting her hand touch Neil's cheek gently,
cradling the curve of the boy's face, his expression beginning to melt
ever so slightly.

Then Nieve's body lurched into action, the hand seeming to move in slow
motion as it lifted away from the boy's cheek momentarily, then
swinging immediately back into it with a loud crack, whipping Neil's
head to the side as the cracking noise of the slap echoed through the
chamber.  Nieve remained frozen in position for a moment, her breaths
obviously coming harder, and Neil could see from the corner of his eye
the same enraged sorrow that he'd seen the day they had first made love.

"You're a monster," she hissed, her eyes not flashing with anger so
much as utter disgust.  A dull ache was growing between her legs, and
she couldn't help but feel as though she'd been dirtied, as though
Misato and Eiko were both seeing her as some kind of Babylonian whore.
"I regret every second that I spent on you, every time that our lips
found each other, every second that I let myself believe for a second
that you were even -human-.  I regret -everything-."  Tears were
streaming down her face, and she stared at the boy harshly, feeling an
emptiness inside her as he remained frozen, unmoving, still reeling
from the slap.  "Don't touch me again.  Don't come -near- me."

Neil's eyes fluttered shut, and Nieve felt her tears redoubled, felt
the abandonment that had been eating away inside of her begin to claw
with greater ferocity, the cruel joke of existence finding an even
better punchline.  The moment was frozen in time before Nieve pushed
past Neil and began running out of the hangar, tears streaming from her
face, only the most distant vestiges of control remaining on her body
as the door hissed and whirred as it opened and closed.  If Neil had
gone comatose from the slap, everyone would have believed it, his body
remaining rigid and his eyes remaining shut.

Only Eiko and Misato remained, and something was obviously bothering
Eiko as well as she stepped towards the boy, her eyes wide, her mouth
half-opened, one hand brought up near her mouth and the other wrapped
around her midsection.  She brought herself within an arm's length of
Neil, but she lacked the decisiveness to slap the boy, could only gape
as he remained unmoving.  Neil said nothing as she too moved past him,
following after Nieve, obviously just as disgusted and conflicted as
Nieve.

The door whirred and shut behind Eiko, leaving just Neil and Misato in
the room, the steady sound of the rushing nutrient bath substituting
for words between them.  "Neil," she said softly, trying to snap the
boy back into action, taking a step towards him.  She still wanted to
believe what he had said, but it was becoming more and more difficult
with each passing second.  "Neil, talk to me.  Please."

"Let me speak to Commander Ikari."  The words had a decidedly different
tone to them than his flat speech before, now tinged with obvious
sadness, tears beginning to trickle out from behind his eyes.  Misato
recoiled slightly, surprised, but Neil slowly turned his head to face
the woman, letting his eyes open, bloodshot and a brilliant green.  "I
need to talk with him immediately."

Misato paused, biting her lip.  The last thing that she wanted was to
let Neil talk to the man, knowing full well what Neil was going to say,
that there was no possible way he would be willing to keep her few
traces of a family together any longer.  But she also knew that keeping
him from the commander would only hurt him further, and she'd learned
that she didn't want to hurt him, that she wanted to let him find some
kind of release.  It was the mental equivalent of an irresistable force
meeting an immovable object, and a few minutes passed in silence,
Neil's tears running down from his face and mingling with the dripping
LCL, falling down into the bath of liquid that fed the Eva.  At length,
she shook her head, then turned on her heel, beginning to walk down the
catwalk towards the command center.  "I'll tell him that you need to
see him.  Get changed, and I'll meet you outside of the locker room."

Neil was alone again, with no onlookers but the merciless purple Eva, a
sight that was spared only a curosry glance as the boy stared around at
the empty room.  The touch of Nieve's hand had snapped him back to his
senses, to the horrible realization that he had been unable to avoid no
matter how much he wanted to.  "The Eva didn't do anything I didn't
want it to," he gasped, tears redoubling and vision blurring as he
looked back towards his machine, knowing full well what he had to do.
"Niobe was right.  God damn me, she was completely right."

A weakness overtook the boy's knees, and he fell into a kneeling
position, his hands folded over his eyes to buffet the tears as he
leaned back, wailing at nothing.  The Eva simply stared as the boy
kneeled as though in prayer, his cries of sorrow and anguish filling
the chamber, echoing off the teal-gray metal walls and the stoic gray
jaws of the Evangelion.

                                  ]++[

It had been perhaps half an hour since Neil had told Misato that he
needed to speak with Commander Ikari, but it felt like years, as though
he had needed to spend al,l of the interceding time learning to shut
himself off.  He had managed to regain control over himself since he
had started crying, and he stood across the room from the commander
managing to look calm, wearing the same blue shirt that he'd come to
Tokyo-3 in, his eyes fixed on the commander as the red light of the
office glossed over both of them.  "Neil Richelieu," said the commander
curtly, his voice flat and emotionless.  "You claimed you needed to see
me."

"Yes," replied Neil, forcing himself to feel nothing, to simply stare
at the light-obscured eyes of the commander and let his mouth form the
words, not to let himself cry again.  "I need to talk to you about.."
He trailed off, trying to start over, to phrase his case better.  "You
certainly saw what happened against the Thirteenth Angel."

"Of course.  You destroyed it and made certain that it was dead.
Excellent work."  The commander reached and adjusted his glasses, then
tented his hands in front of his mouth once again, the distance and the
eye-bleeding light more that sufficient to prevent Neil from picking up
any facial cues from the commander.  "What about it?"

"Commander..."  Neil paused, then shook his head, not wanting to
explain emotional reasoning to the commander, doubting that it would
make any sense to the man in the first place.  It looked as though the
commander had long ago stopped paying attention to emotional urges, and
Neil felt more than a little disgusted with himself without thinking of
the emotions of what he had done.  "Commander, I don't think it's right
for me to pilot the Eva any longer.  I have reason to believe that I
may be a danger to myself and to my fellow pilots."

"Nonsense.  You attacked a known threat and dealth with it
appropriately."  There was no resignation in Gendou's voice, and for a
brief moment Neil wished that he could blame the whole mess on the
silent maliciousness of Ikari, that it was somehow out of his hands.
But he knew better, and even as the commander stared at him he knew
that Dr. Ikari's uninvolved attitude had hardly turned Neil into a
monster.  "Nothing that you did was outside of what a normal operation
would have done.  I have no reservations about sending you into combat
again."

"I'm aware of that.  -I- have reservations about sending myself into
combat again."  Neil's voice had taken on a sharp edge, a tone that he
might not have been willing to take with the commander if he had
retained any intention of remaining with NERV.  "Whatever you say, I
didn't have to nearly kill Vash just to destroy the Angel.  I know
that."  He paused for a moment, lowering his hand slightly, one hand
twitching itself into a fist.  "Even if you don't approve, I can leave
the organization whenever I decide.  I have responsibility for my
actions, and that includes preventing them."

Gendou simply stared at Neil for a moment, showing no reaction to the
boy's harsh words other than a vague amusement.  "Very well," he said
after a moment, remaining stationary.  "You will be forced to vacate
housing with Major Katsuragi, and a transport plane back to America
will be arranged by mid-afternoon tomorrow.  You may arrange for
transport of your belongings and accomodations for tonight.  Once you
leave, you will be closely monitored to ensure that you reveal no
confidential information such as the nature of the Second Impact or the
Evas, and you will no longer be allowed inside any NERV facilities.
Are you certain about this?"

Despite himself, Neil couldn't stop the tears from streaming down his
face, soaking into his shirt as he lowered his head further, everything
in his being protesting his actions.  But he knew that he had no
choice, that if there was no other way to control the horrible monster
that he was then his only option was to remove himself from the
situation.  "I believe that I am more of a threat to the human race
than the Angels.  I'm certain."

"A message will be placed with the upper-level staff.  Meet with them
and they will deal with the removal of your personal ID and all other
important information relative to NERV.  You will leave the facility as
a private citizen once again."  He paused briefly, expression and
position never faltering, the shadows crouched around him seeming to
grow darker.  "In the event that the situation becomes too desperate,
NERV may call on you again, but that would require the death of all
remaining Children.  For all intents and purposes, your career as a
pilot has ended."

"Thank you, sir," Neil choked out through a haze of tears and
suppressed sob, turning and walking as swiftly as he could towards the
exit.  He hadn't wanted to admit it to himself, but NERV had become his
life in a way that he'd never expected, had grown to define who he was
and where his place was in the world like nothing else in his life.
But he had no alternatives, and he knew that there was no way for him
to continue piloting EVA-01, not after what he had done to Vash.
Struggling to maintain the barest veneer of composure, he let the door
open in front of him for what he knew to be the last time, his tears
only growing as it whirred shut behind him.

Gendou remained stationary in his seat, simply watching the empty space
where Neil had been moments earlier as if the boy was going to return
and beg for Gendou not to remove him from NERV, protesting that he'd
made a mistake.  Instead, he could hear the soft padding of bare feet
behind him, his silent observer finally stepping forward.  "You are
letting him go?" she asked, tone flat and emotionless, the light note
that it hit the only indication of her identity.

"Neil is not on as specific a timetable as you and your brother,"
replied Gendou, unmoving, resisting even the urge to flick his eyes
sideways towards the girl.  "He may well be easier to deal with once
the first stage of the project has been completed."  He paused,
allowing himself a thin and bitter smile.  "Besides, the less there is
for SEELE to suspect, the better we look under scrutiny.  I see no
reason to force him to stay."

"I understand," replied the girl in the same flat tone, as though she
truly could care less about the outcome of events, simply interested in
the entire issue as an academic activity more than anything.  Gendou
let the smile remain on his face as he flicked his eyes towards the
girl, knowing that he had only a short time to wait before he was ready
to move forward with his own goals.  For her part, the girl seemed not
to notice, simply staring into the distance emotionlessly, almost as
though someone had bound an atomoton into flesh.

                                  ]++[

More than anything else, Nieve wanted to cry.  She didn't want to get
up, didn't want to get dressed, didn't want to read or talk to Misato
or bother to eat.  She wanted to lay in bed and cry, let her tears soak
through her pillow, let everything bleed away in a forest of sobs as
she thought about the last words that she'd said to Neil, knowing that
it would be the last time that she'd ever see him, wishing that he'd
done somthing differently the day prior.  But somehow she'd managed to
keep herself running on some sort of autopilot through the morning,
rising as usual, getting dressed, eating breakfast, blankly watching
television in a language she didn't understand and didn't want to
understand, waiting for something that she couldn't put into words as
the pale yellow walls of the apartment watched her harshly.

Now she was eating lunch, under the definition that putting together a
sandwich and staring at it with tears in her eyes qualified as eating.
She knew that she needed to eat, knew that simply looking at the
sandwich was starting down the same road that she'd spent so much time
trying to turn away from, but it seemed like a herculean effort to even
watch the food, much less actually eat it.  The limp white bread and
slowly-spreading jelly seemed to be of the same mind as her, sitting on
the white porcelain plate as though depressed, waiting for Nieve to eat
it but not particularly looking forward to the process.  "I don't want
this," she muttered to herself, slumping forward slightly and propping
herself off the table with her elbows.  "What's the point of eating?
Why should I bother?"

Her words snapped her mind to attention, and she only stared at the
sandwich for a moment longer before she slumped fully against the
table, sobs wracking her body, tears pooling about her face and
mingling with her dissheveled red hair.  "All I wanted was for him not
to leave me," she muttered through a mouthful of tears and choked
gasps, her arms circling her head as she remembered the blank look on
Neil's face, as though he didn't care that she was leaving.  All she'd
wanted was to know that he wanted her, for him to take her no matter
how she tried to hurt him.  But he'd done no such thing, simply
listening to her and then letting her go, unconcerned by her
departure.  "I wanted him to love me," she muttered, her words almost
absorbed by her wailing cry, yellow walls dispassionately surrounding
her and seeming to close in as she sobbed.

Then a knock came at the door, as sharp as it was unexpected, drawing
Nieve's attention after a moment more of crying.  She lifted her bleary
green eyes to the door, tears still dripping down onto the wood of the
table, and in the back of her mind she hoped that simply not moving
would be enough to convince the person at the door to leave.  Then she
wondered if it might be Neil, and hoping against hope she pushed back
from the chair and stood, distantly noting that she was wearing the
same green dress that she'd wore on the day she had met Neil, walking
slowly and irregularly towards the door.  "I'm coming," she called,
wiping away her tears, trying her best to look as though she was still
in control, wanting Neil not to see her reduced to her worst as her
hand closed around the doorknob.

A deep breath was pulled into her lungs, then she let the door swing
open to reveal Ryo in the doorway, holding a small paper bag and
standing with his usual rigidity.  "Ryo," she muttered, feeling her
heart sink at the boy's presence, wishing still that it was Neil.
"Come in, I guess.  Misato's not here, so you'll probably want to leave
soon."

Ryo couldn't identify the feeling that was tugging at his chest,
knowing little beyond the fact that it wasn't pain despite feeling
vaguely painful.  He watched Nieve idly as she turned and walked back
towards the table, her dress swaying about her smooth legs, red hair a
mess but still undeniably attractive, and he forced himself to ignore
her movements and follow routine, kicking off his shoes in the small
foyer area before stepping into the apartment, bag swinging besides him
and lightly tapping against his side.  "Aren't you supposed to be in
school?" she asked, her tone bored, obviously asking the question out
of routine.

"Commander Ikari pulled me out of school temporarily," he replied, idly
wondering if he was supposed to disclose the information but not
thinking of any compelling reason not to.  "It's better to focus on the
Angels at the moment."  The statement drew a brief glance from Nieve
before she turned back to her sandwich, and Ryo walked slowly towards
the girl, the same awkward not-quite-pain sensation in his chest as
before.  "How are you doing without Neil around?"

Nieve's body suddenly jerked to a stop, as though Ryo had tried
intentionally to ask her the one question that she didn't want to
hear.  She gritted her teeth as she felt the slow trickle of tears try
to reassert itself, thinking about leaving Neil behind the day before,
about what he must have felt like lying alone in the hotel, without her
arms around him.  "I'm fine," she replied curtly, now definitely
wanting Ryo to leave, unsure of how much longer she could maintain
control over herself under the circumstances.  "Don't you have other
things to do today?  Testing?  Homework?  Practice?"  She let her eyes
flick towards the boy, watching him slowly shake his head in response.
"Why did you come over in the first place, then?"

"I have something for you," replied Ryo, feeling the pain redouble
itself as he lifted up the bag.  Nieve's green eyes moved to follow the
bag, briefly flitting back to Ryo and surveying his bland school
uniform before standing and taking the bag from him tenatively.  She
surveyed the bag now, as though it was going to bite if she opened it,
and Ryo felt another surge of the tense chest pain that wasn't quite
pain, his mind working hard to try and figure out how to alleviate it.
"I thought you might like it.  I've been working on it for a while now,
for you."

Flicking her eyes up to the boy one last time, Nieve tenatively opened
the bag, her mind still entirely focused on Neil and wishing that the
pale boy would just leave.  She didn't dislike him, but he'd picked the
worst possible time, and she knew that almost any other day of the year
she would have simply kicked him out and been done with it.  Her hand
slipped inside, feeling the rough surface of wood brush against her
skin, and curiosity got the better of her as she closed her hand around
the object inside and drew it out.  She wondered about it for only a
moment longer once she'd removed it from the bag, recognizing it as a
small statue of EVA-02, almost a photorealistic replica of her red
machine aside from the dearth of color.  It was photorealistic in a
disturbing sense, though, as though it had been machine-produced
instead of hand-sculpted, and Nieve noticed a few darker blotches on
the surface that gave her momentary pause.

"It's..."  Nieve paused, trying to find a word that described her
reaction accurately, the way that it was well-done to the point of
being disturbing.  Shaking her head, she looked back towards Ryo, the
boy's blank red eyes staring back at her and eerily reminiscent of the
absent color on the carving.  "You... you must have worked hard on
this, Ryo," she said, lost in a sea of still-present sorrow from Neil's
departure and the unmentionably disturbing nature of Ryo's gift.  "Have
you ever had any training in woodcarving?"

Ryo felt another surge of the awkward pain in his chest, and he took a
step towards Nieve, knowing that it was time for him to do something
even though he wasn't entirely sure what that "something" was.  Neil
was out of the picture, meaning that she could no longer love him -
he'd heard more than enough about the way that the two had parted to be
certain of that.  But something still felt wrong, as though he was
making a leap of logic beyond himself, something that he couldn't
derive by routine.  "I thought you would like it," he said, somewhat
softly, knowing that he was supposed to speak softly to someone who
loved him.  The girl's eyes went wide, and unsure of any other elements
necessary he proceeded on to the next step, leaning towards Nieve with
his mouth leading the way.

Nieve only hesitated for a moment before she let her hand fly, striking
Ryo hard across the cheek and sending a crimson flush across the impact
point.  Ryo recoiled for a moment, then turned his head with disturbing
sluggishness back towards the girl, red eyes open and quizzical, as
though he truly had no grasp of what was happening.  "What the hell do
you think you're -doing-?" she snapped, stepping backwards and feeling
her breath starting to come more heavily, awkwardly reminded of the
first kiss that she and Neil had shared.

"Trying to kiss you.  I thought that was what we did now."  He paused,
leaning back into a standing position, head cocked slightly to one side
with a quizzical expression on his face.  "You no longer love Neil,
therefore you're free to love again.  I gave you something.  Don't you
love me now?"

"Why, you..."  Nieve sputtered in anger, tears beginning to puddle
about the corners of her eyes as she remembered the way she and Neil
had parted once again, wanting badly to be alone and cry once again.
Stepping forward, she grabbed Ryo's shoulders and spun him around,
shoving him forcefully back towards the door.  "Get out of here, Ryo.
I don't want to see you right now, and if this is the way you're going
to act to me I don't want you to come around ever again.  Get out."

Pushing his feet out, Ryo tried to stop himself from moving any further
forward, utterly confused as to how the routine had managed to fail.
He quickly went through the steps in his mind, wondering if he'd
forgotten something after all, if there was some detail that he
missed.  "What did I do wrong?" he asked, stumbling down into the shoe
area as Nieve stopped pushing him, turning around to frown at the girl,
his red eyes flicking about the room and trying to pick up on some
hidden visual cue.  "I thought that I completed the routine
successfully.  What did I miss?"

Ryo's gaze burned at Nieve's skin, and she felt a dull ache creeping
through her body as she glared at the boy, as though she'd lost the
ability to even control who came and went.  "Don't you understand
anything, Ryo?  Love isn't some fucking mathematical equation, it's an
emotion, a state of -being-.  I don't fall in love with you just
because you give me some creepy little statuette that looks like it's
mass-produced."  She knew that she was being hurtful again, just like
she had been with Neil, but what made the entire situation even more
disturbing was the fact that Ryo was simply staring at her weakly,
apparently unconcerned with her words.  "Get out of here, Ryo."  He
stared at her, and she slammed her fist against the wall in frustration
and terror, worried that he might try something even as she felt
herself losing control of her tears once again.  "Get out!"

Lingering for only a moment longer, Ryo reluctantly slipped on his
shoes and stepped out the door, a profound confusion flooding his
thoughts as he stepped back into the hallway.  He had thought
everything through, had made sure that he had all of the steps in
place, and yet somehow he must have made a mistake with the routine,
must have failed to do what he had set out to do.  "Perhaps Niobe knows
something," he muttered to himself, doubting that he could speak to any
of the other Children, less concerned with solving the problem than
with the confusion that hung over his mind like a thick veil.  Glancing
once out the bay window in the hallway, he began walking towards the
stairwell that led out of the building, trying to figure out how he had
managed to make a mistake and how he could correct it.

Standing inside the apartment, Nieve could hear the wet plopping noise
of her tears falling against the floor beneath her, and within moments
she sank to her knees, sobbing once again from the horrible
recollections that she'd had with Ryo.  She felt alone, helpless, and
much as she hated to admit it she wanted her mother's arms around her
once again.  "I can't do anything," she muttered, head bowed and tears
streaming forth, running along her skin as she closed her eyes.  "I
just wanted him to stay."

                                  ]++[

It was an antiseptic white room, the sort of color that bled against
the dull fluoresence of the lighting to make the physical boundaries
seem to sort of melt and slough out of their shapes.  Eiko had never
particularly liked the way that hospitals looked, and her dislike had
only grown since her brother had been put into one, necessitating
frequent visits to his bed in the same artificially sterilized tone of
paint.  She'd idly hoped that NERV would have put slightly more
imagination into the way that its infirmary was structured, but as she
stepped into the white room she could see that it was exactly the same,
that if nobody told you it was impossible to remember that you were
underground.

Taking a deep breath and smelling the sharp odor of medicine and
sterilization, Eiko walked towards the bed, the lone spot of color in
the room, pale blue sheets covering a body surrounded by IVs and
monitors, an oxygen mask lying against the face of the slowly-breathing
boy.  Vash's blonde hair was lying limply against the pillow, his eyes
closed as he took in slow, obviously-pained breaths, body moving
slightly against the sheets.  The girl felt a momentary rush of panic,
seeing how weakened he looked, as though the simple presence of another
human being threatened to break him irrevocably.  But she didn't want
to leave him alone, and armed with the memory of the head doctor's curt
acknowledgement of her visitation pass she continued to walk towards
the boy, dressed in a light blue skirt that reached down to her ankles
and a brilliant white t-shirt, an outfit that she knew Vash had always
liked.

Her footfalls filled the room with a new sound, echoing oddly against
the steady rush of Vash's breathing and the regular beeps of the
condition monitors.  Biting her lower lip, she stepped towards the lone
chair placed to one side of his bed, sitting down in it and pulling it
closer to the boy, surveying him briefly.  She had been told that he
might lose his left arm, but from what she could see the lump in the
sheet was still there, meaning either that they'd saved the arm or that
they simply hadn't removed it yet.  A sigh escaped her lips, and
raising her arm she placed it down on his right arm, trying to find his
hand beneath the sheet.

Vash's breaths changed frequency unexpectedly, and Eiko gave a slight
start as the boy's eyes began to flutter slightly.  She watched, trying
to remain calm as he opened his eyes with obvious effort, a weak smile
managing to pull itself across his face beneath the oxygen mask, eyes
concealing an understandable sadness as he stared at the girl.  "Hey,"
he hissed through the mask, cocking his head slightly to the side to
get a better look at her.  "They said I would be getting visitors."

"We're the visitors, dad," she replied, letting a smile creep across
her face as the boy managed a weak laugh, sounding more like a cough
with the steady hiss of the oxygen mask.  Both of the Children remained
silent for a moment, unsure of what to say, as though they both knew
the obvious topic but also were afraid of speaking any more about it
than was absolutely necessary.  At length, Eiko coughed lightly,
glancing over towards Vash's arm once again.  "They were able to save
your arm, I see."

"No, they weren't," replied Vash, sighing slightly as he lifted the arm
from beneath the sheet, an obviously herculean effort in his weakened
condition.  Eiko didn't notice anything different about it at first,
but as she looked closer she could see that it was noticably paler than
she remembered Vash's skin being, far lighter than the skin on his
face, even under the seeping harshness of the fluorescent light.  "The
doctors said that they were able to rebuild the arm from the remaining
tissue.  I only found out about it after I had woken up."  He sighed, a
harsh raspy noise beneath the mask.  "It feels... wrong.  It's my arm,
and I know it, but... I don't know.  They said it wasn't a normal
procedure, and somehow I can tell."

Eiko wanted to cry in lieu of being able to do anything else for Vash,
but instead she simply reached over and touched his arm gently, feeling
the soft skin, devoid of any marks save the IV needle that jutted
roughly out from around his elbow.  "At least you've still got it," she
said, moving her hand away as he dropped the arm back to the sheet, her
eyes wide and brimming with tears despite herself.  "And at least
you'll be okay.  Things could have been much worse."

"You're right," replied Vash, obviously aware that the conversation was
beginning to step into rather dangerous conversational territory, as
though the two Children were stepping around a landmine.  "I was only
distantly conscious up until that point, and I didn't even fully wake
up when the entry plug started moving.  But I remember that it hurt."
His smile became weaker and more bitter, his head turning back towards
the ceiling, blue eyes flicking away from Eiko.  "Kind of ironic, I
suppose.  I was unconscious before, and then Neil comes along and
crushes me right back into unconsciousness."

The girl wanted to force a laugh, but all she could manage was a slight
choking noise, drawing Vash's eyes if not his head back in her
direction.  "I... talked to Neil," she said, unsure of what his
reaction would be, surprised to see that he simply continued staring at
her with the same sort of pained and bitter expression on his face.
"They think that the Eva went berserk, and that's what Neil said,
too."  She paused, struggling to meet Vash's eyes with her own.  "The
Eva probably just thought that you were part of the Eva.  It wasn't
Neil trying to kill you, or anything."

"Of course.  I didn't think he would do something that malicious."
Something in Vash's voice spoke of suspicion, a hidden doubt of Eiko's
words, as though there was something in the background of Neil's
statement that made it impossible to believe.  A silence settled
through the air between the two Children, Vash flicking his eyes back
towards the ceiling, Eiko staring at him and wishing that she could
think of something more to say.  "Shouldn't you be at school today?  I
mean, I know I have an excuse, but..."

"I do have one," replied Eiko flatly, the question itself feeling
vaguely hurtful, as though Vash was resentful of her presence in the
room.  "NERV gave me a pass out of school for the day.  Special
circumstances."  She paused, trying to figure out the best way to
proceed, knowing that she needed to give Vash the news.  "It was Misato
that did most of the work for that.  I think that she's just feeling
kind of sad now, considering everything that's happening."

Vash tilted his head back towards the girl, his breath coming a little
rougher as he stared at her, blue eyes briefly losing their focus
before training once again on the girl sitting at his side.  "What do
you mean?"  He paused momentarily, then began to try and struggle into
a sitting position, shocking Eiko visibly.  "How long have I been down
here?  Are the Angels already destroyed?"

"Nothing so pleasant," replied Eiko, pushing gently down on the boy's
chest, feeling him struggle against her hold, his body unable fight
against even her admittedly limited strength.  He gave up after a
moment, though whether it was out of actual trust or the realization
that he wouldn't have been able to go anywhere even if he managed to
get to his feet.  "You've been down here less than a day.  No,
it's..."  She paused, still unsure of exactly what to say.  "Neil put
in his resignation yesterday.  He's leaving for America sometime this
afternoon."

Silence reigned for a moment, the boy looking at her as though he
couldn't believe her words, testing to see if she was telling the truth
about Neil's departure.  "Oh," he replied at length, sounding rather
weak, turning his head away from the girl and flicking his blue eyes
back towards the ceiling.  "I guess that's for the best, isn't it?  I
mean, he didn't like it here much anyways."

"Yeah," replied Eiko, also sounding entirely unconvinced, folding her
hands uncomfortably on her lap and following Vash's gaze, her eyes
winding up staring at a patch of dull white on the wall.  She felt as
though she was being watched, putting on some kind of elaborate play
for an unseen and unknown audience, a distant sorrow lurking behind her
eyes that Vash would have been able to see had he only looked up.

                                  ]++[

Misato leaned against her car, feeling the warmth of the metal beneath
her skin, wearing her black dress with its thin white piping,
sunglasses on and eyes focused on the door in front of her.  She had
given Neil a specific meeting time, and as she stared at the monolithic
white hotel in front of her, light reflecting off the black-tinted
windows to make the entire building almost seem to radiate, she had
little doubt that he would be meeting her within moments.  In the back
of her mind, she half-hoped that he'd chosen not to meet her, that he'd
lost his nerve as was instead going to simply remain in his room and
refuse to come down.  "But that wouldn't bring him back to NERV," she
muttered, shaking her head and letting her purple hair brush lightly
against the back of her neck.  "Nothing will, not now."

She had already packed some of his things into the bacseat of her car
but knowing without a doubt that she wouldn't be able to unhook the VCR
she'd left it, though she was half-hoping that it would be enough of an
excuse to get Neil back.  She missed the boy already, and it had been a
hard night with only her and Nieve in the house, lonely and empty, made
worse by the fact that Nieve didn't seem to want to talk about what
happened and Misato still wondered if she wasn't in some small way to
blame for the whole thing.  It had shown on her face all day at work,
and Kaji had called her on it, barging into her office shortly before
she was leaving.

"What are you planning on doing?" he'd asked her, leaning up against
one teal-gray wall, the self-righteous smirk finally gone from his face
but his expression still implying that he didn't particularly care.  At
the time, Misato had been upset by his cavalier attitude, but in
retrospect she knew that Kaji didn't have any real reason to be
worried - he didn't know Neil, at least not in the way that Misato
did.  He was simply showing concern for a friend and former lover, just
wondering how Misato was going to deal with it.

As it happened, she didn't think she did a particularly good job
dealing with Kaji, letting herself remain silent after he'd asked the
question for a good few minutes.  "I'm tired of losing people I care
about," she'd said at length, the only explanation that she could come
up with, knowing that it hardly fit the header of a plan so much as a
general desire.  She could remember glancing at Kaji then, half-wanting
him to take her in his arms, to hold her, tell her that everything was
going to be all right, the way that he would have comforted her if she
hadn't driven him away.

Of course, he'd done no such thing, a fact that hadn't surprised Misato
in the slightest.  "None of us want to lose something we care about,"
he'd said flatly, his face turning serious just as he'd turned to
leave, hands shoved in his pockets and back slumped just enough to be
unusual for him.  "Sometimes we don't have a choice about it, though.
Sometimes the ones we care about don't want us to hold on to them.
You've got to respect that, too."

Sighing heavily, Misato adjusted her sunglasses, forcing herself back
to the present as she glanced idly at her watch, unsure if Neil was
officially running late yet or if she was just getting impatient.  He
still had five more minutes by the hands on her watch, and she let out
another sigh as she tilted her head back towards the hotel.  Kaji had
been referring to when she'd asked him to leave, and she'd known that
at the time, but she'd never let herself stop to think about what it
might mean if Neil did the same thing.  Biting her lower lip, she tried
to push the thought from her head, not wanting to deal with the concept
if she could avoid it, not even wanting to acknowledge Neil's departure
as a real possibility.

Then the doors of the hotel swung open outward, and Misato had to force
herself to keep her eyes from widening at the sight of Neil, to keep
herself from dropping to her knees and begging him not to leave.  He
was wearing the same outfit as the day prior, slightly more wrinkled
and dissheveled, his eyes the same blank green as he stepped towards
the car.  A thin bristle of facial hair had sprouted along his face
since the day before, although Misato couldn't be certain if he'd not
shaved out of necessity or a simple lack of motivation.  "This looks
like a nice hotel," she said flatly, drawing his eyes blankly towards
her, wishing that he didn't look quite so dead in the water.  "Must
have cost a fair bit.  You're making good use of the money NERV's
paying you."

"I suppose," replied Neil, casting his eyes to one side as he felt a
burning wetness behind them, forcing himself to continue breathing
regularly despite the temptation to do otherwise.  He had promised
himself that he wouldn't cry, that he would do what he knew was the
right thing with some dignity even if it killed him.  But he knew that
he wouldn't be able to last long, that even with the exhaustion he felt
from the tears of the night before they were still coming again.  "Can
we leave now?  The flight's a long one, and I want to be there as early
as possible."

Misato frowned momentarily, then nodded, opening the pasenger door and
letting Neil step into the car weakly.  She shut the door behind him
and began walking around the back of the car, glancing in quickly to
see him slumped weakly against the seat, remembering the first time
that she'd met the boy.  Taking a deep breath, she squeezed her eyes
closed and forced herself to keep moving, finishing her steps around
the car and sliding into the driver's seat, starting it with the twist
of her keys and letting it begin moving out along the road to the
airport.

For a little while, the steady noise of music from the radio
substituted for conversation between the car's two occupants, the
constant noise of instruments seeming to choke the air and prevent
either of them from speaking even if they wanted to.  Misato would
occasionally glance over towards Neil, flicking her brown eyes at the
boy, but each time he was simply staring out the window towards the
passing scenery, the white buildings and green hills seemingly
plastered next to the black roads.  Neil, for his part, was doing his
best not to cry, feeling guilty and weak for even contemplating crying
more, knowing that he was supposed to be a man and be stronger than the
tears, that cry wouldn't do him any good in the situation.  It was
harder than he'd expected, and it was all he could manage to focus on
the scene whipping past, comitting each square inch to memory, knowing
that he'd never see the city like this again.

At length, Misato frowned, then reached over to the radio and pressed
in on the volume knob, cutting the music off just as it began to reach
a crescendo.  Neil gritted his teeth and turned towards the woman,
still trying to keep his eyes focused elsewhere, and out of frustration
Misato made a quick signal and pulled onto the side of the road,
ignoring the few angry beeps behind her.  "Stay," she said flatly,
turning towards Neil and ripping the sunglasses away from her eyes,
letting the concern flash clearly out of them.  "Don't leave.  Don't go
back to America.  Stay here and keep piloting the Eva.  I won't deploy
you if you don't want to, just... stay here."

Neil bit his lower lip hard, trying to focus on the pain instead of the
woman sitting beside him, knowing that he had to do the right thing
even if it killed him, that he simply didn't have the option of
remaining.  "I can't," he said slowly, wanting to take back the words
as soon as they were out of his lips, wanting to cry on Misato's
shoulder and not have to go back to the way that his life had been.  He
knew that doing the right thing could hurt, but he'd never known that
it could be so painful before.

"Yes, you -can-," replied Misato, her voice becoming more forceful as
she stared at the boy, the blonde hair falling lightly about his head,
green eyes trembling slightly in the light as though he was about to
cry.  "Just come back with me to NERV, and I'll get them to put you
back on the personnel records.  You'll be a pilot again.  If you're
that frightened of the Eva... I don't know, I'll make sure that you
don't see any more action inside the machine."  She could feel the
barely-healed wounds from the day prior burning, wondering if her
injuries weren't as healed as she'd been told or if it was simply a
side-effect of her stress.  "Think about Nieve.  Think about -me-."

"That's why I'm -leaving-," snapped Neil, whipping his head away,
forcing himself to focus instead on something, anything to keep him
from crying again.  He couldn't help but wonder in the back of his mind
if part of his sorrow didn't come from the fact that he was such a
horrible person, that he truly wanted to stay and hurt the others
more.  "Misato, I... I can't be certain about whether or not the Eva
went berserk."  A lie, and he knew it - he had no doubt in his mind
that the Eva had only done what he had wanted to, knew that even when
his thoughts had become hazy in the first battle the machine as
listening to what he wanted underneath everything else.  "I... I... I
don't think that I'm suited to piloting anymore.  I'm afraid...
afraid..."  He trailed off, mouth unwilling to force out the end of the
sentence, his eyes closing tightly and letting a single pair of tears
trickle out.

Misato stared at the boy for a moment longer, eyes wide, trying to
figure out something to say that would convince him that he was still
wanted, some perfect combination of words that would let him know that
he should stay in Tokyo-3.  She wondered, in the back of her mind, if
this was what Kaji had gone through the day that she had left him, if
he'd been certain there was some phrase that would make things all
right again.  "I can't force you, I suppose," she managed at length,
turning back towards the wheel and pulling the car back onto the road,
trying to resist the urge to lean over and take the boy in her arms, to
sort out her own feelings about the situation even as she continued
slowly through the shining white city.

The rest of the ride was made in relative silence, neither Misato nor
Neil willing to reach over and turn the radio back on, resulting in a
tense absence of any sounds save the car's engine and the minor noises
from outside.  Neil remained fixated out the window, his mind devising
horrible punishments for himself as he stared into nothingness, wanting
very much to accept Misato's offer to return and stay in the city,
almost surprised with himself at him it had become his home in such a
short time.  It seemed as though the trip would never end, as if it was
some kind of slow-motion torture through the city, reminding him of
everything he was leaving behind and everything he would miss, the
silence only making everythng worse.

Sooner or later, however, the ride had to end.  Neil knew that, and as
he felt the car ease into a rather definitive stop just outside of the
airport he knew that it was the end of the line, time for him to leave
forever.  "We're here," announced Misato weakly, obviously simply
saying something for the purpose of breaking the silence instead of
needing to convey the information.  Both remained motionless inside the
car briefly, Neil staring out over the gray asphalt of the runway and
Misato staring at the back of the boy's head, then Misato opened her
door and got out, every noise she made echoing inside of Neil's skull.
"Come on, then.  Let's get your stuff unpacked for the jet."

Neil hesitated for a moment, then opened his door and got out, opening
the back door and slowly taking out the neatly-packed boxes from the
backseat.  He frowned almost involuntarily as he unpacked, knowing that
something was missing just from looking at the supplies, his eyes
darting about and trying to figure out what it was as he tried to avoid
looking at Misato or Nieve's neatly-scrawled writing that labeled the
boxes.  "Is everything here?" he asked at length, deciding that there
was nothing wrong with having a last memory of Misato's voice in his
head, resisting the urge to break down and cry once again.

"Almost," replied Misato flatly, grunting slightly as she lifted one of
the heavier boxes and placed it down on the runway, a thin layer of
sweat beginning to emerge on her forehead.  "There were a couple of
things that I left there... like your VCR.  I wasn't sure how to unhook
it."  She paused, taking a sharp breath, knowing that she was grasping
at straws as far as ways to keep Neil in the city went.  "You could
come back and get it, if you like.  Nieve is there, and she probably
wants to say goodbye."

"It's all right," replied Neil, flushing slightly as he remembered the
sting of Nieve's hand across his face, the anger and disgust in her
eyes, the soft feel of her lips and the wonderful electricity that came
from her caress.  He'd been doing his best not to think of her or Eiko
at all since their last encounter, knowing full well that it would only
make the already-difficult farewell nigh-unbearable.  "I have another
one at home.  Maybe after all of this is over, I'll come back and get
it from you.  But this isn't the place for me if I'm not going to be
helping."

Misato let her hands wrap around another box, idly noting that it was
almost the last one, that in a few minutes she would be saying farewell
to the boy that she'd live with for what seemed like an eternity.
She'd known, from the beginning, that goodbyes would come eventually,
that when the Angels were defeated they would all go their separate
ways once again.  NERV would become a research organization once more,
the Children would return to their lives, and she would find other
people and friends, maybe wind up signing on with the UN peacekeeping
forces.  But she'd always thought that it would be under happier
circumstances, something that she'd look forward to.  The sweat from
her forehead began to drip down to her lips as she put the box on the
dull gray runway pavement, tasting salty enough to almost feel like
blood.

Then she heard the sound of the door on Neil's side closing, and she
flicked her eyes back inside to realize that the car was empty.  It had
gone too fast, faster than she'd expected, and she could feel a vague
panic gripping her from within, a knowledge that she no longer had any
time left to convince the boy standing in front of her not to leave.
For his part, Neil was simply staring at her, the vaguest hints of
tears beginning to form at the corners of his eyes.  "I guess this is
it, then," he said weakly, staring at Misato for only a few seconds at
a time before flicking his eyes away towards whatever minor distraction
he could find.  "I'll keep an eye on the news, and all.  Make sure that
you're all doing all right."

A weak nod was the best that Misato could manage as she walked back to
the driver's seat, the keys feeling heavy in her hand, the boy turning
away from her as her high heels clicked against pavement.  He was
closing his eyes, letting the tears begin to seep out from the corners
as he wished that he was in a movie, that something would keep him in
the city, give him a reason not to leave.  He didn't want to leave.
Much as he was afraid of piloting the Eva again, he didn't want to
throw everything he'd built in the city away, no matter how much of a
monster he was.  But his jaw remained set, and as he heard Misato
opening her door he stifled the urge to cry out, knowing that if he
didn't do anything else right he would do this the way he should have
as soon as the Twelfth Angel freed him.

"I believe you, Neil."  The words came from Misato's direction, and he
turned sharply to see the woman standing just outside of her driver's
seat, sunglasses back on, the vaguest trail of a tear visible on her
left cheek.  "Even if you don't believe yourself, I believe you didn't
mean to crush Vash in there."  She paused, lowering her head, feeling
guilty even as she knew that the boy wouldn't get back inside the car.
"You're just children.  It's not fair to entrust you with decisions
about life and death, to force you to grow up before you're ready."  A
momentary pause, and she reached up to remove her sunglasses, letting
Neil stare into her eyes and fixing his gaze in place.  "I trust you
because you're a good person, Neil.  And if you think that you're doing
the right thing... I don't doubt you for a second."

Neil, unable to look the woman in the eye any longer without crying,
closed his eyes and turned his head away, wishing above all that what
she was saying about him was true.  She stared at him for a moment
longer, then Neil heard the sound of the door shutting once again.  For
the barest of moments, he let himself believe that she had closed the
door without her in it, but the illusion shattered moments later as he
heard the engine start, the car pulling gently away from him, turning
around, and driving away from the airport.  Neil simply stood in place,
tears streaming down his face, staining the blue of his shirt darker
tones as he consoled himself with the knowledge that Misato was wrong
about him being a good person.

                                  ]++[

The entire control room had fallen somewhat silent at the sight of the
gigantic black-white beast on the horizon, moving slowly over the
waters near Tokyo-3 towards the fortress city.  There had certainly
been larger Angels, but something about the build of this one simply
seemed to exude power, the white bundles where arms would have been and
an almost laughing bone-white face somehow combining with the huge
black body to make it seem like a messenger of death.  "Fourteenth
Angel on steady approach towards city," announced Makoto calmly, his
fingers dancing across the keyboard, blank readings emerging from each
scan but not slowing his motions in the slightest.  "Still too far out
to get any kind of definite readings.  UN aerodrones should be within
attack range within twenty seconds."

Makoto opened his mouth to speak again, but was cut off by the cool
hiss of the elevator door, and he whirled about to see Misato walking
in swiftly from the elevator, still pulling on her red command jacket
as her heels clicked against the metal of the floor.  "Sorry I'm late.
The alert hit me when I was driving back from the airport."  She
hesitated for a moment, frowning as she remembered the way that she and
Neil had parted, then stepped up to Makoto's console, surveying the
Angel on the main screen.  "This is number fourteen, right?"

"Right.  Nothing solid about its capabilities yet, though."  As the
young man spoke, the awkward forms of the aerodrones began to swarm
about the Angel, and Misato paled slightly as she began to get some
sense of scale from their eerie resemblance to ants besides the beast.
They were firing on the Angel, but it barely even seemed to notice,
letting the tiny octagonal ripples explode across the surface of its AT
Field as it continued moving over the water.  "Looks like a fairly
potent field, though.  Most of them at least pretend to care about the
aerodrones."

"Could just be getting smarter," replied Misato, leaning on the balcony
over the level below, glancing briefly down towards the red tops of the
Magi out of habit before looking towards the Angel again.  She knew
that she had a job to get done, that she couldn't be letting Neil's
departure distract her especially under the circumstances, but it was a
restriction that was easier said than done, and she couldn't help but
remember the way that the tears had been coming out of the boy's eyes
as she left.  "Maya, what's the status of the Children?" she asked
after a moment, shaking her head and turning towards the young woman.

"Everyone's ready except for the Fourth and..."  Maya stopped, her
omission glaringly obvious as she blushed and leaned her head closer to
the console screen.  "Right.  The Fourth might be able to get inside of
an Eva and pilot it, but his doctors don't recommend it."  She paused
for another moment, drumming her fingers along the keyboard and
bringing up another display.  "Dr. Akagi's still supervising the repair
of EVA-00 - the arm has been regenerated to the elbow, complete with
armor plating, but according to her it'll be at least another twelve
hours before the machine is fully ready for operation."

Thinking for a moment, Misato nodded, turning towards Maya and trying
to ignore the young woman's minor slip-up, less out of anger towards
the technician and more out of her own guilt.  "All right.  Maya,
launch EVA-04 and EVA-02 towards the center of Tokyo-3 - until we have
a clearer picture of what the Angel is capable of, I want to make sure
that they're not in any direct danger."  She paused, not wanting to say
that EVA-01 was on standby even though she knew it was, the thought of
someone other than Neil piloting the purple machine mildly repulsive.
"Hold the others on standby."

"Standby?"  Niobe's voice filled the control room, and Misato couldn't
surpress a sigh as the girl's face appeared before her, obviously
distraught at the woman's decision.  "Misato, put me out on the front
lines!  I know that I didn't do so well against the last Angel, but if
you give me the chance I promise that I'll -"

"For the love of God, Niobe, I gave you an order and I expect you to
follow it!" the woman snapped, tilting her head slightly forward out of
frustration, lifting one hand to massage her temple.  "Your machine was
damaged during the battle with the Thirteenth Angel whether you like it
or not, and we don't know if EVA-01 will even activate with you
inside!  Nieve and Eiko are going to the surface, you're on standby
with Ryo!  Is that clear?"

A tense silence settled over the control room as the girl's face
shifted to an expression of obvious pain, lips tight and eyes wide
before the small portrait of her faded into nothingness.  Misato
sighed, still rubbing her forehead, still feeling the thin layer of
sweat lying upon her brow as she leaned forward, the noises from the
battle site with the Fourteenth Angel and the aerodrones hitting her
hears like jackhammers.  "Major?" asked Makoto tenatively, turning his
chair slightly towards the woman.  "Are you -"

"No," replied Misato, shaking her head and knowing full well what the
man was going to ask, the tension of the Angel mingling with her
underlying tension about Neil as she forced herself to take slow and
regular breaths.  "I'm not even close to okay.  But we can't deal with
that right now, can we?"  She smiled bitterly, then shook her head and
forced herself back to a standing position, trying to convince herself
that Neil had made the right decision even as she felt a headache
beginning to slice its way into her brain.  "Launch EVA-02 and EVA-04.
We'll deal with my problems later."

The LCL swirling about her as she moved to face upwards, gritting her
teeth as the Eva began its upwards motion, Nieve couldn't help but feel
a minor twinge of panic, an underlying worry that she wouldn't be able
to defend against the Angel without Neil around.  She wanted to believe
that she wouldn't have any problems, but she felt her confidence lurch
along with her machine as the entire tunnel suddenly shuddered,
whirling her about in the cockpit and filling her mouth with the dull
bloody taste that seemed to always accompany the Eva being injured.
"What the hell was -that-?" she snapped, trying to convert her sadness
into anger, to be productive instead of sad.

On the command level, Misato was staring at flashing damage displays
before she answered Nieve, unable to believe her eyes.  She had known,
on an academic level, that the massive black Angel was getting closer,
but she hadn't believed for a second that it was getting close enough
to attack Tokyo-3.  As she flicked her eyes between the damage display
and the main screen, however, she knew that there was no way to deny
it, that the Angel had proven itself more than capable of being
aggressive.  "That was the Angel," Misato said into the microphone, her
voice trembling through the communication.  "It just blasted the
surface layer of armor.  It... it sheared through ten levels of armor
with a single blast.  Another couple shots like that and we're done
for."

Nieve felt a momentary rush of deeper panic as she and Eiko emerged on
the surface, the sun setting behind the huge black beast, her hands
tight around the handle grips as she thought about what such power
meant in the hands of the Angel.  She wasn't equipped to fight
something like that, and she yearned momentarily for Neil to still be
beside her, for somebody to be protecting her, keeping her safe from
the horrific power of the Angel.  Then she forced herself into action,
her machine springing aside towards the nearest weapon deposit,
retrieving a standard-issue rifle even as she saw Eiko moving in the
opposite direction.  "Eiko, what the hell are you doing?  You're
leaving yourself wide open?"

Eiko was distantly aware of what Nieve was saying, but as she snatched
a pair of handguns from the depot she ignored the warning, more
concerned with the immediate situation than with the academics of the
battle.  She'd seen Neil do it before, the way that he would lose
himself in a battle rage, and she had more than enough anger, enough
rage to direct into the black monstrosity that was slowly turning its
oddly-shaped face towards her.  "This is for Vash, damn you!" she
shouted, letting the handguns fire off as she dashed about the
buidings, her machine a silver shadow flitting about, bullets exploding
against the AT Field with the standard octagonal ripples.  She knew
that all she had to do was focus, was to make herself angrier, that she
could be an Eva pilot, that she wouldn't fail after what the last Angel
had done to Vash.

As Nieve watched, the Angel's eyes flared with brief surges of power,
and an explosion of energy slammed into Eiko's machine, a brilliant
white corona of an explosion that turned the buildings surrounding the
silver machine into nothing more than crumbling black outlines.  Eiko
herself was thrown backwards as the explosion blossomed into the shape
of a cross, her Eva's AT Field gone and black sears covering the
surface of her machine.  "EVA-04 has sustained severe damage!" shouted
Makoto over the radio connection, Nieve gritting her teeth at the sight
of how easily Eiko had been laid out.  "AT Field has been broken
completely, armor at less than .5%!  Machine has gone into emergency
shutdown mode!"

The Angel was looking towards Nieve now, and grimacing the young girl
opened fire, raking the shells against the surface of the Angel's AT
Field, watching the beast's eyes carefully for the flash of light as
she dashed through the buildings, a growing panic in her mind.  She
wanted to have Neil by her side again, and as she saw the quick flash
of light she knew that she was getting sloppy because of it, knew that
she was losing control of her situation all because of one silly boy.
Gritting her teeth more tightly, she flung her Eva to one side as the
same blast of energy erupted from the ground beside her, seeming to
come out of nowhere and slam into her machine even as she tried
desperately to avoid the assault.

It felt as though a sledgehammer had been driven into the side of her
stomach, and Nieve cried out as her machine was sent tumbling though
the air, losing its grip on the rifle as it flew across towards the
foothills of Tokyo-3.  The pilot cursed at the loss of control as she
stumbled to a stop, Eva lying down on one side, the AT field only
remaining at the barest level of power.  "But I didn't fall for that
trick," she snarled, forcing herself back to her feet, turning the red-
white face of her Eva towards the Angel defiantly.  "Is that the best
you've got?  Just that energy blast?"

Nothing happened for a moment as Nieve stumbled to her feet, the Angel
hovering closer but not unleashing another blast of energy.  Then the
two bundles where its arms would have been unfolded swiftly, revealing
two long trailing ribbon-like whips.  Nieve's eyes widened as she
stared at the Angel, the beast lashing the whips quickly against a pair
of surrounding buildings before letting the appendages lash out towards
the girl.  Both struck the Eva at the knees, and Nieve screamed as she
felt her lower legs suddenly go numb, a burning pain shooting through
her body as she felt her Eva fall backwards from the sudden lack of
legs below the knee.

"EVA-02's pilot is going into neural shock!" shouted Makoto, a distant
sound for the girl as the Angel carelessly slashed away her arms,
leaving her lying against the foothills and screaming in agony.  She
knew that she had lost control, that the boy she though she loved had
left her, and that the Angel was about to kill her for her failure, the
LCL choking her nearly to death with the thick taste of blood.  A few
quick lashes from the beast carved away part of the chest armor, and
Nieve was distantly aware of the sight of a large red orb set
underneath the armor of her Eva, the core of her own personal Angel
clone.  Then she looked up to see the Angel's ribbon-arms lunging
towards her eyes and her core, and she screamed.

Makoto may have said something, but it didn't penetrate the girl's mind
as she felt the world suddenly go black and cold, feeling herself
suddenly huddling naked against a cold wet floor.  Tears were streaming
from her face, and she could only sense blackness around her, knowing
full well that she was dead, that she'd managed to fail everyone, that
she'd lost control.  "I did everything wrong," she muttered, letting
the tears fall down her bare skin, the despair feeling like a physical
presence.  "I let mother down."

"You never let me down."  The voice was one that the girl hadn't heard
for what seemed like an eternity, but Nieve forced herself to open her
eyes and look up, her eyes going wide at the sight.  Her mother was
kneeling before her, wearing the same red and orange plugsuit that she
remembered from the day she had died, the suit structured like Neil's
but obviously made for a female body.  The woman was smiling, her short
red hair brushing against her neck as she extended a hand towards her
daughter.  "You made me proud.  Everything you did in this machine made
me proud, Nieve."

Nieve's eyes were wide and disbelieving, but the sense of her mother's
touch against her cheek was undeniable.  "Mother?" she asked
tenatively, reaching out herself, letting herself touch the woman's
cheek, her neck, her hair.  Then the tears began to flow more strongly,
and she launched herself towards the woman, holding her tightly, the
tears an odd mingling of distress and happiness.  "Ma!  You're back!  I
get to see you again!  Oh, Ma, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry about everything
that I did back then, I..."

"We can't talk."  The statement was curt, not angry so much as
decisive, but equally cutting to the young girl as she let herself lean
slightly away from the woman and stare.  Leigh Soryu-Leary's outline
was fading slowly, dissolving into the blackness surrounding both of
them.  "I'm sorry, Nieve.  I'd wanted to talk to you, but this is the
only chance I'll ever get.  The only way that I could keep you safe
from the Angel was to give myself."

The skin against Nieve's fingers was becoming mroe distant, and she
felt the tears quickly changing notes to fully mournful, struggling to
hold her mother tighter.  "No!  Ma, don't leave!  Please, don't leave!
I'm older now, I've got a handle on things!  Whatever's going on, I
promise, I'll save you!  Please, Ma, don't leave me again!"

"I'm sorry, Nieve," replied the woman, her body now almost wholly
ephemeral, enough for Nieve to see clear through the woman.  "But I
couldn't let you die, not here, not now.  I want to thank you, Nieve,
thank you for being my daughter, for riding in this thing with me.
It's been hard for both of us, I know, but we did our best.  I
hope..."  She paused, her voice becoming more distant.  "I know that
you'll become a fine woman one day.  I just wish that I could see it."

"-MA-!"  The scream was shrill, Nieve's arms tightening more until
there was nothing around her, her tears falling into the nothingness
around her as she felt her world seem to dissolve again.  She regained
consciousness in the sea of LCL that was her cockpit, nothing but
blackness and blood-orange liquid surrounding her.  "Don't go, Ma," she
whispered, leaning back against the seat and letting herself cry,
distantly hearing the Angel moving through her twisted wreck of an Eva.

                                  ]++[

Neil had heard the Angel alarm clearly as it had begun to tear through
the city, the wailing siren warning the residents that they needed to
evacuate in preparation for another installment of the ongoing siege
between the great beasts and NERV.  He had chosen to ignore it, to
simply sit at the airport and hear the barking warning without doing
anything, waiting for the plane that would take him out of the country
and back to his real home.  Though it was certainly difficult to block
out the sound of the sirens along with the growing noise of the
aerodrones firing at the thing, he had managed it as best he could,
wrapping himself in a ball of self-loathing.  "I have to not pilot the
Eva again," he'd muttered.  "I'm a monster.  I can't be trusted."

Then he'd heard the sound of the Evas launching, and despite himself
he'd been unable to stay seated, drawn to look towards the battle
between the Angel and the titanic machines out of a sense of guilt if
nothing else.  He had walked as close to the battle as he could get
while still staying inside the airport, giving him a mostly-clear view
of the battle, the massive black Angel towering over EVA-02 and EVA-
04.  His heart had quickened slightly at the thought of who would be
piloting the two machines, but he'd tried to remind himself that he
could be just as dangerous to them, that he needed to wait for the
plane to arrive, that trying to do something would only make things
worse.

He'd smelled the gunpowder and smoke all too clearly from his position,
seen as the first explosion blossomed into a cross and sent Eiko
crashing against the buildings around her like discarded rubbish.  He'd
seen the second blast hurl Nieve away, and although she'd been obscured
from view at that point, he'd seen enough of the Angel to know that it
had then made certain she was not getting back up.  Neil doubted that
they were dead, but he had no way of knowing, and from the second that
he'd seen Eiko get blasted he knew that he had to do something.

The Angel was turning now, slowly leaving behind EVA-02, and Neil was
struggling to sort out his emotions as he watched the black beast turn,
its bony face with half-open mouth seeming to laugh at him for his
uselessness.  "I'm just as bad as the Angels, though," he muttered to
himself, his hands slowly clenching and relaxing.  "I could have wound
up hurting Nieve and Eiko.  I'm an Angel in my own right, and I -"

A sudden realization hit him like a splash of cold water, and Neil felt
every muscle in his body tense even as tears began to flood from his
eyes anew.  Guilt sliced through his mind as he realized what he'd
done, realized the sort of coward he'd been, saw starkly the way that
he was behaving as the sun set behind the Angel.  With the last few
fingers of the sun's light extending over the horizon, blocked by the
massive shadow that the Fourteenth Angel threw across the cityscape,
Neil took a brief glance around the land before jumping from his perch
at the top of the airport, letting himself fall and tucking his body in
as he prepared to roll down the steep hill of the airport.

His landing hit hard, but Neil had developed some skill at dealing with
pain if nothing else since he'd begun piloting the Eva, and instead of
wincing he simply let himself roll, the fall helping to augment his
speed as he tumbled down towards ground level roughly.  Clumps of grass
and dirt tore along his clothes, but he barely noticed, simply forcing
his legs into the soft ground and digging his hands in to bring himself
to a stop just shy of ground level.  Pausing for only a moment to get
his bearings, he glanced up towards the airport, realizing as almost an
afterthought that it was much further than he'd originally thought,
then jumped down to the streets of the city, glancing about for an
entrance to Central Dogma.

Eyes settling quickly on the nearest pair of metal doors bearing the
trademark NERV insignia, Neil set off running, ignoring the growing
sense of exhaustion seeping through his body, feet hitting the black
pavement at regular intervals as sweat dripped into his mouth in
regular salty explosions.  The door was his only goal, and as he grew
closer he found himself slowing, finally coming to a halt a few feet
shy of the actual destination.  "My keycard," he muttered, shaking his
head as he drew out the small piece of plastic.  "It's probably not
working any more.  They won't let me in."

Then an explosion tore through the city, shaking the ground underneath
Neil's feet as the world filled with the harsh noise of shattering
concrete and asphalt.  Neil gritted his teeth, then slammed the card
through the reader beside him, hoping against logic that it would
successfully let him in.  The reader flashed no verification, but a
second later the doors creaked open, just sliding far enough apart for
him to wedge himself through.  Smiling even as his tears continued to
flow, Neil hurled himself towards the doors, letting himself slip into
the Geo-Front and head towards the machine that he knew he should be
piloting.

                                  ]++[

Niobe's machine waited patiently beneath the surface of the Geo-Front,
Central Dogma several meters behind her as the Angel blasted away
relentlessly at the armor that shielded NERV's underground sanctuary
from Angel attacks.  It had always been a distant possibility that an
Angel would make it through to the bottom level of NERV, and Niobe
couldn't help but be thankful for that as she further braced the twin
rocket launchers against her sides, mentally refreshing in her mind how
many shots she would get out of the weapons, her breath quickly taking
in and exhaling the LCL, mind completely ignoring the lush scenery
around her.  "I've got to destroy this one," she muttered, training her
launchers towards the spot where chunks of rock were already beginning
to fall from the surface of Tokyo-3 into the Geo-Front.  "I have to be
able to destroy another Angel.  It'll make Ryo love me, I'm sure of it."

The corona of the explosion burst through the stony ceiling, energy
billowing outwards in the shape of an upside-down cross as the Angel
began its descent.  Niobe took one last deep breath within the LCL of
her machine, then waited for the crosshairs on her display to line up
and flash an acknowledging green, the launchers trained perfectly on
the beast in front of her.  "Engaging Fourteenth Angel!" she screamed
over the communicator, her hands slamming the handrests forward even as
the two rocket launchers she wielded roared to life, plumes of flame
jetting outward towards the descending black monstrosity.

Eleven rockets spiraled out from the launchers before Niobe even knew
it, their plumes of flame arcing about as the first pair impacted hard
against the beast's AT Field accompanied by the octagonal ripples that
she knew would come.  Both rocket launchers feel to the ground, then
without hesitation she drew another pair just as quickly from the
ground around her, littered with Eva weaponry deployed at Misato's
command.  She had known she would need more firepower than a single
pair of launchers, and in one fluid motion she had brought the
replacements to bear, pointing directly at the Angel, the display
taking only a moment before it flashed green and allowed her to once
again release a series of rockets towards her target.

Much to her surprise, the Angel seemed unconcerned with even the effort
of dodging, letting the rockets impact against the field steadily while
it slowly descended towards ground level, Niobe's assault continuing
and filling her ears with the sound of roaring flames.  For a moment,
she wondered if the beast would attack her early, her leg muscles
tensing in anticipation of a necessary dodge, but the Angel did
nothing, simply let itself hover down as Niobe discarded the second
pair of launchers and quickly scooped up a third in one quick motion.
"Angel doesn't seem to be counterattacking!" she shouted over the comm,
seeing it move towards her slowly as she tensed and prepared to begin
moving herself.  "I'm taking evasive maneuvers immediately, as a
precautionary measure!"

Something might have come over the radio, but Niobe didn't notice it,
her Eva launching into movement, her eyes remaining focused upon the
Angel and keeping the crosshairs flashing a brilliant green, geysers of
flame erupting from the twin barrels of the rocket launchers.  Her
movements were steady, trained, and as the launchers clicked empty she
quickly leaned down and scooped up another pair, letting herself train
her eyes immediately back upon the Angel.  There was no reaction from
the black goliath except the steady ripples of octagons through the air
and the slow motion in Niobe's direction, both more than acceptable by
her train of thought.  "Makoto, how's the Angel's AT field holding up!
Will I need to close in and finish it manually?"

"Niobe, according to our sensors, you've barely dented the thing!"
Misato's eyes flicked up briefly towards the main screen, watching the
yellow Eva dart in circles around the hovering black Angel before
glancing back towards Makoto's display.  There was a tangible tension
flooding through the control room simply at the presence of the Angel
in the Geo-Front, something that none of the beasts had managed
before.  "It's not being hurt, it's just ignoring you!"

"That's -impossible-!" snapped the girl, forcing her machine to move
faster as she let out a series of brilliant red flares, the rockets
slamming in an explosive barrage against the surface of the Angel's AT
Field, scooping up another pair of launchers as she clicked empty.  Her
feet slammed hard into a lake, the first time she'd even bothered to
notice the scenery, this time more out of the simple fact that she knew
she would be fighting from a disadvantage.  "I've -got- to be hurting
it!  That's not -possible-!"  Grimacing, she launched her machine
forward, the taste of salty blood hard against her tongue as she let
out more shots from the launcher, landing and grabbing another pair as
she trained her shots back towards the beast.  "I'm the best!  I'm
better than -any- of the other pilots!  I can destroy -one- goddamn
Angel on my -own-!"

Before Niobe could even react, the Angel's arms began to unravel into
razor-sharp whips, trailing down to the ground and scraping small
furrows, then lashing upwards towards Niobe before she rolled away.
She needed to get close to the Angel to hurt it, to try and close with
it in order to neutralize the AT Field, but as it lashed the whips
about it seemed to be taunting her, like a cat enjoying the terror of a
mouse.  Forcing her Eva to a stop, Niobe let herself drop the two
rocket launchers that she'd been holding, scooping up another pair and
bracing herself against the ground, her fingers tightening against the
triggers.  "I'm not going to be afraid," she muttered, watching as the
whips tore against the ground of the Geo-Front, her teeth gritting
tightly as her eyes widened.  "I'm the best.  I can do this.  I can do
this -easily-."

Ignoring the sound of warning shouts coming over the radio, Niobe
launcher her machine forward, letting the yellow golem spring towards
the beast, avoiding a quick lash of its whips as she spread her AT
Field as wide as she could.  The Angel lashed towards her again, but
she was already moving again, this time letting the leg muscles of her
Eva launch her into a run, taking advantage of the naturally enhanced
speeds of her machine, letting herself feel as the Angel's AT Field
grew closer and closer.  Her fingers tightened on the triggers as she
watched the octagons start to ripple out, then as they dissolved into
nothingness she slammed her machine's fingers down, letting the rockets
in the launchers arm themselves and begin to slide out towards the
Angel.

Then the whips lashed towards her with blinding speed, and before she
could react the Angel had stabbed both thin metallic strands through
the barrels of the launchers, jamming the missiles in mid-flight and
leaving them primed to explode as the whips drew themselves out.
Niobe's eyes widened as she realized what the beast had done, and she
released the launchers, trying to move away from them before the
inevitable happened.  She was too late, and she couldn't help but
scream as she felt the explosive force of the launchers' entire
payloads tear into her arms, chunks of metal mingling with the burning
heat of the explosion, ripping away armor and flesh alike.

Once the explosion had faded Niobe could feel herself nearly choking on
the bloody LCL, her lower arms aching in a way that she'd never
experienced, her mind tenatively reaching out towards that of her Eva
as she distantly heard the noise of the control room filled with
alarmed shouts.  She could feel nothing of her left arm below the
elbow, and her right arm felt mangled, broken, as though it had begun
to bend in ways that it wasn't supposed to.  Glancing down quickly, she
felt her teeth grit as she saw the ruined bloody stump on her left and
the shattered tan armor on her right, both arms useless as anything but
clubs.  "Niobe," said Misato's voice, sharp in her ear, sounding almost
as disapproving as Joseph's.  "You're too badly damaged.  Withdraw."

"-NO-!" screamed Niobe, a blood rage filling her world as she began to
launch her machine towards the black monstrosity once again, breath
coming quickly, legs thundering across the artificial greenery as the
Angel lashed in anticipation.  "I'll kick it to death!  I'll do
something, I won't -retreat-!"  She screamed, springing towards the
Angel, doing her best to compensate for the lack of balance provided by
her arms, wishing that she'd trained more without them for such a
situation, her right leg preparing to lash out in a kick as she flew
towards the Angel.

Before she had even made it halfway to the beast, it had lashed up
towards her once again, the twin silvery whips stabbing into the joint
between her pelvis and her hips, sending fire along her lower regions
and a scream into the LCL of the cockpit.  The Eva's legs fell to the
ground in an awkward puddle of blood, and the limbless torso slammed
ineffectually into the Angel before falling hard to the ground, Niobe's
entire body on fire with agony as she cried.  "No," she snarled,
watching as the Angel began to turn away and head towards Central
Dogma.  "No!  NO!  NO, NO, NO!  Finish me!  PLEASE!"  Her pain was
fading, and a moment later the visual links was severed as the Eva
became a distant memory.  "Please... don't leave me like this..."

"Severed neural link," announced Maya, the entire command center
seeming almost haunted as Niobe's limbless body twitched once before
falling still.  Maya stared at the main screen for a moment, then back
towards the monitor at her disposal, feeling particularly useless.
"The good news is that the Second Child isn't dead - her vital signs
are a little erratic, but both she and the Fifth are still alive."

"The bad news is that if we don't destroy this thing soon, we're all
going to be destroyed," muttered Misato, her brow furrowed tightly,
trying to force herself to figure out some kind of plan to stop the
Angel.  It had resisted everything they had to throw at it, every
defense and offense, and all that NERV had left was one damaged Eva and
one injured pilot.  Sighing, she tilted her head slightly forward,
knowing that she only had one course of action truly remaining to her.
"Makoto, one my mark -"

"Deploy the First Child in EVA-00," announced Gendou, the sudden noise
of his voice drawing the attention of nearly all within the room
towards the top level of the complex.  Despite the situation, Gendou
seemed to still be perfectly confident about the outcome, his hands
tented in front of his mouth, eyes hidden behind his glasses.  "Arm the
Eva with an N2 mine, for detonation upon contact with the core of the
Fourteenth Angel."  He paused briefly, then adjusted his glasses
slightly, flicking his eyes towards Fuyutsuki for the barest of
moments.  "Maya, contact the medical wing.  Have them prepare Vash for
piloting EVA-01."

"Vash can't pilot that!" shouted Misato, realizing as soon as the words
were out of her mouth that at least part of her apprehension came from
the simple fact that she still felt uncomfortable about the thought of
someone else in the cockpit of the purple Eva.  She knew that it was
entirely the wrong time to be thinking about such things, but as the
sweat dripped down past her lips she couldn't push the thought from her
head.  Besides, she knew that she had better reasons for refusing the
assignment.  "He's in no shape to walk, much less pilot an Eva!  If you
make him get in that thing, he'll die!"

"And what will happen to us if he does not?" replied Gendou, a thin
smile managing to creep across his face, hidden behind his hands as he
flicked his gaze down towards Misato.  "Two Evas remain, and we have
with us two Children capable of piloting them.  I would prefer to
exhaust all of our alternatives before destroying the Geo-Front.  Maya,
launch EVA-00, and contact the medical department."

Misato frowned, glacing quickly towards Maya as the young woman half-
turned her chair to stare at the purple-haired woman.  She knew,
academically, that Gendou was right, that if EVA-00 failed Vash would
be just as dead either way.  It was a simple decision on an academic
level, and as she nodded towards Maya she knew that she was doing the
right thing even though it felt like signing the boy over to a death
sentence.  "Launch EVA-00 on an interception course with the Angel,"
she snapped, trying to fight down the tension rising within her chest,
to forget how close the Angel was getting to Central Dogma and all that
was contained within, to not think about the fact that EVA-01 would be
launched into battle without Neil at the helm.

On the upper level, Gendou nodded as the technicians shouted quick
announcements towards one another for the Eva's launch, the same
procedure that they would have followed under any circumstances, made
commendable by the danger of the situation.  Turning his chair, Gendou
stood and glanced over towards Fuyutsuki, the elder man staring
stoically at the main screen, watching as it switched to show EVA-00
launching into the Geo-Front.  "I will go to oversee the activation of
EVA-01.  The Fourth may need some coercion before he enters the entry
plug."

"This could be the end," replied Kozou flatly, eyes never twitching
from the screen, the display moving back to the slow-moving Angel
retreating from the wreckage of Niobe's Eva.  "But you already know
that, don't you?"  He paused, then let a humorless smile move across
his lips, the red alarm lights in the command center springing to life
from the Angel's proximity.  "You still think we can cheat God."

"I am not cheating God out of anything," replied Gendou, stepping
calmly towards the elevator and letting the doors slide open, the hiss
lost in the sudden blaring of alarms throughout the facility.  "God is
the one that has been cheating.  I simply wish to level the playing
field."  He paused, then stepped inside of the elevator, one hand
reaching out and holding the door open for a moment longer as he turned
back to look at Fuyutsuki.  "This will not be the end.  We have too
much left to achieve."

Below, Neil froze briefly, the sound of the alarm flooding the narrow
teal-gray hallway that he found himself in, a distraction as he tried
to figure out where he had to go to get to the Eva hangar.  He didn't
know exactly where the Angel was, but he was willing to bet that time
was running out, knowing full well that the alarm hadn't sounded the
first time he'd been struggling to navigate NERV's corridors with
Misato.  Taking a deep breath, he fought down the panic within his gut,
turning right down the nearest corridor, feet falling harshly on the
metal floor of the hallway, green eyes flicking about for some
indication of his location.

Sirens were the only noise that penetrated the command room as Ryo's
machine burst to the surface, an awkward stump on its left arm, green
N2 mine cradled within its right arm as its single red eye turned
towards the advancing Angel.  Misato knew that the boy was waiting for
her to give him orders, but it took her a moment to gather the nerve,
knowing full well that the task before him was tantamount to suicide.
"Ryo, advance forward at top speed and bring the N2 canister into
contact with the core of the Angel.  We will detonate the bomb remotely
at that time."

"Understood," replied Ryo, his voice sounding like the same emotionless
tone that he always used, blue machine starting to lurch forward in an
awkward loping run.  It was only afterwards that Misato realized there
had been a note of sorrow beneath his voice, as though the boy knew
full well that he was going on a suicide run before he'd even begun to
surge forward.  Misato bit her lower lip, forcing herself not to say
anything as the blue machine continued forward, flashing red lights of
the center playing across the monitor in what seemed to be a wash of
blood.

Ryo's hands clutched the handles of the cockpit tightly, his breath
coming quickly and shallowly, focused entirely on the task at hand.  He
still hadn't figured out what had happened with Nieve, but he knew now
that he would have no chance of asking her or trying again, that in all
likelihood the black monstrosity in front of him would be the last
thing that he ever saw, the final picture that would fade from his
bright red eyes.  At the same time, however, he knew that he had to
destroy the beast, that he was the only pilot left that had the barest
chance, and he knew that it fell on his shoulders even if he didn't
like it, that it was the one part of routine that had remained stable.
He was the one that had to be sacrificed along with his Eva.

Frustration boiled within Ryo's head, although he could not have put
the name to the emotion as his breaths came more sharply, a grimace
slowly twisting across his face.  Feelings buried under layers of
routine bubbled shallowly to the surface, and as Ryo watched the
scenery around him blur he wondered if he was the one responsible for
breaking the routine, if perhaps it ultimately came down to him.  He'd
been told by Dr. Ikari that he was different than the others, but he'd
never known what that meant, only known that he had to obey procedure,
that steady motions were his universe.

The Eva charged forward, AT Field mingling with that of the Eva,
octagonal ripples disappearing as the Angel lashed upwards with its
metallic whips.  Both stabbed through Ryo's torso, and he winced, but
his focus remained, the last gasp of routine stinging through his mind
as he shifted his grip on the N2 canister.  Giving one last push, Ryo
swung the bomb up and slammed it against the red core of the Angel,
feeling something only for a moment before he watched with mild
disappointment as the Angel snapped a bony cover over its core, like a
bird closing its protective eyelid.

It was too small of a detail for any of those inside the command center
to notice it, and all that they saw was the Angel being hit by the
canister.  "Detonate!" shouted Misato, leaning forward against the rail
of the level, watching intently as the red lights flashed over the
screen and then faded away once more.  The canister exploded outward
into a wall of flame, and Central Dogma rocked, the shock of the
detonation slamming against the pyramid-like structure and sending
Misato falling backwards onto the floor even as she distantly heard the
elevator hissing open.

Apprehension filled the command center, and Misato only spared a quick
glance back towards the elevator to see Ritsuko standing in awe before
she scrambled back to her feet, flicking her eyes back towards the main
screen and hoping against all odds that the Angel had fallen.  A moment
later, the dust and smoke of the explosion cleared, just in time for
the command center to watch the Angel toss aside Ryo, the blue machine
slamming into the ground harshly before the beast continued its
advance.  "Makoto, status of the Angel" she breathed, flicking her eyes
only briefly over to the young man before gaping back at the goliath on
the screen.

"Unharmed," pronounced the technician, his eyes also fixated on the
screen, the fact of the beast's proximity seeming to seep quietly
through the chamber even as the alarms wailed.  "At this rate, the
Angel will reach Central Dogma in five minutes."  He paused, then took
a deep breath and turned back down towards his console, keying in a
quick sequence.  "I'll start setting the Omega protocol.  If the Angel
tries to get past us, it won't survive the attempt."

                                  ]++[

Neil had no way of knowing how bad the situation was getting outside,
but he did know that something was going seriously wrong as he felt
Central Dogma shudder under an assault from outside, sending him
stumbling to the ground.  Cold metal slammed into his side, but with a
slight grunt he forced himself back into a standing position, dashing
through the doors in front of them as they slid open, letting his feet
fall on the catwalk suspended over the empty bay for EVA-00.  The
absence of the blue machine clued him in further to NERV's increasing
desperation - he knew that Ryo had sustained serious damage, that they
wouldn't send out the Eva unless they were grasping at straws - but he
forced the thought out of his mind as he rushed in through the last set
of doors between himself and EVA-01.

Then, exhausted and panicked, Neil stumbled to a stop, the doors to the
hangar sliding shut with a hiss behind him as he fell to his knees.
The purple golem was still there, staring stoically at nothing, its
surface now clean of the blood of EVA-03.  "Always drawing me back," he
muttered, sweat running in rivers down from his forehead into his
shirt, the salty liquid flooding past his lips as he gasped for
breath.  "Niobe was right."  He let his eyes flutter closed, his body
aching and yearning for rest, the Eva watching him dispassionately.

"You are no longer its pilot."  The voice was unexpected, drawing Neil
out of his reverie as he snapped his head up towards the small box that
overlooked the Eva hangar.  Gendou Ikari stood in the window above,
black jacket hanging about his red turtleneck, looking for all the
world like the way that Neil remembered first seeing him.  His face was
disapproving, eyes invisible behind the lenses of his glasses.  "You
chose to no longer pilot the machine.  It is no longer your concern."

"I made a mistake," croaked Neil, slowly drawing himself back to his
feet, fabric shifting uncomfortably around him as he dragged himself to
his full height.  "I ran away.  I was afraid."  Taking a deep breath,
Neil tensed his muscles once again, holding himself rigid, forcing his
breathing to come more regularly.  "I'm here now, though.  I'm not
running away any more."

"How nice for you."  The commander's tone was critical, and Neil felt
his eyes narrowing before he heard the hissing and whirring of an
opening door sounding over the alarm sirens.  Whirling about, Neil saw
a stretcher being wheeled in, a small cluster of technicians
surrounding the white bed, lab coats trailing and fluttering as the
wheeled Vash into the hangar.  It took Neil a moment to recognize the
other boy, plugsuit stripped of any coverings on the arm and the boy's
hair lying limply around his head, but as he stared it became clear to
him what Gendou was planning on doing.

Vash coughed, then forced himself into something resembling a sitting
position, eyes glancing up slowly to see Neil standing in front of him
despite their blurry focus.  Neil could only watch in terror as the
other boy's eyes met his, blue and green eyes exchanging looks, both
Children freezing in place Gendou and the Eva watched.  Silence seemed
to fill the room, and Neil felt guilt surging in his chest anew, the
urge to turn around and run away from the horrific things that he had
done almost unbearable.  Both remained quiet, waiting silently until
the base shook once again.

As the hangar rocked from the impact of what was no doubt the Angel's
attack, Vash began to tumble off the bed, and Neil's reflexes snapped
into action, his body lunging forward and catching the other boy as the
nutrient bath around them sloshed.  Vash winced with pain, but before
Neil could help him back onto the bed he felt the other boy's arm reach
up and grab his shirt collar, yanking his gaze down towards the injured
Child.  "You came back," muttered Vash, voice raspy as blood began to
seep through his bandages.  "Why did you come back?"

"Because I shouldn't have left in the first place," replied Neil, a
single tear managing to pull itself out of the corner of his eye as he
helped Vash back onto the stretcher.  "I'm sorry."  He paused, resting
his hands against the side of the other boy's bed, the sadness and
anger gripping him even as his eyes rested on the Eva for just a
moment.  Then he turned fully towards Gendou, eyes flashing, hands
clenched into fists.

"Send me out!" he shouted, taking a step towards the commander, trying
to read something into the man's blank expression and hidden eyes.
"I'm not going to sit on the sidelines for this.  I am..."  He paused,
head faltering slightly before his neck snapped back up, his jaw set
firmly.  "I am the Third Child!"

Misato stumbled to her feet, still reeling from another assault on the
base, the walls of the command center beginning to visibly crack even
as the red light washed through the room.  "Armor down to 15%!" shouted
Makot, ignoring the sounds of technicians on the lower levels panicking
and running, the command level seeming to be the only level where
everyone wasn't heading for the hills all of a sudden.  "That's been
only three blasts!  We're not going to survive another one!"

Glancing up at the main screen, Misato could see the leering grin of
the Angel stretching before them, the black monstrosity leaning closer
and preparing to tear open the face of Central Dogma.  "Thanks for not
leaving, Makoto," she said calmly, placing her hand on the young man's
shoulder and glancing towards Ritsuko.  She found herself strangely
unconcerned about the Angel's approach, wondering idly where Kaji was
as she managed a smile towards Ritsuko, her eyes flicking back towards
the main screen to see the Angel's eyes flashing with energy.  "Here it
comes!"

A flash of light send the entire wall of the base tumbling inwards, and
Misato could hear screams fill the room as the Angel glared at the
control room, its upper body leaning down and forcing itself into the
control room.  Misato could ee how close the beast was, but she forced
herself not to panic, simply staring at the monster, knowing that she
wouldn't be able to escape another Angel.  In the back of her mind, she
felt something resembling relief at the fact that Neil had left, and as
the Angel's eyes flashed she took a deep breath and closed her eyes,
wondering if it would feel like it had when her father had been
engulfed by the Second Impact.

With a roar of rage and sorrow, Neil sent the Eva crashing through the
side wall of the control room, his vision only focusing on the Angel
long enough to know where it was and slam into it.  A great crashing
noise filled the air as the purple golem collided with the Angel's AT
Field, then a moment later the field dissolved into nothingness and
send Neil's shoulder slamming hard into the black monstrosity, forcing
it to one side and slamming the thing's leering face against the
nearest wall.  The beast struggled to bring its whips to bear, but as
Neil stepped into the massive pit in front of the main control layer he
felt no fear, only anger at the beast in front of him, a burning hatred
at the thought of what it had done to Nieve and Eiko.

"But that was my fault," he muttered to himself, feeling his anger
redouble as he felt the familiar guilt creeping into his mind, his arms
forcing the Angel further back as he crouched and sprang at the beast.
His cockpit beeped a quick warning to let him know that he was down to
four minutes of battery power, but he ignored it, focusing on the Angel
rearing back away from the base, his feet hitting ground as he landed
and tried to shove the Angel further back.  Behind him he could see the
red light flashing, oddly fitting as he drew back the Eva's arm and
slammed it into the Angel, sending the beast floating backwards
slightly out of sheer surprise.

For the first time ever the Geo-Front was shrouded in night, the
overhead lighting damaged by the Angel's entrance and cut from power
when Neil had stepped into the control center, leaving EVA-01 to
struggle with the beast in the darkness, the green decorations on the
beast and the red core of the Angel the only glints of color that
Misato could see.  She was still reeling for a moment, watching as the
Eva drove back the monstrosity, amazed at the machine's quick response
and savage movements.  "Maya, who's piloting the Eva?" she shouted, an
idea forming in her mind, at once terrifying and exciting.

"The Third Child!" Maya shouted back, barely able to contain her
astonishment.  "Synch ratio is up to 67% and rising!  Neural activity
is off the charts!"  She paused for a moment, hammering a few quick
commands into the console at her fingertips.  "The Eva's running off of
internal power, though!  It's only got three minutes left!"

Screaming in rage as the bloody LCL washed over his body, Neil felt
himself losing himself to the cradling rage of the Eva, his anger at
the Angel's treatment of Nieve and Eiko coupling with his anger at
himself.  The Angel was staggering, its whips flailing uselessly as he
continued to drive the beast back, only distantly aware as one of the
flailing metal limbs cut deeply into the thigh of his machine.  Misato
may have shouted something over the radio, but it was lost in the sound
of the Eva's fists slamming hard against the beast's dark hide, sending
it do the ground forcefully.

Neil's eyes only distantly took in the darkened scenery as he sprang on
top of the Angel, dropping his Eva into a crouch and letting the fist
hammer towards the Angel's core.  The impact of the golem's knuckles
sent a small spiderweb of cracks along the glowing red orb, and Neil
felt his lips curl into a smile as he stared at the damaged core, his
arm slamming another blow into the target without hesitation.  He would
have never admitted it before, but he was enjoying the experience of
fighting the beast, the way that it winced underneath his blows, and as
one whip moved up to lash at him he simply reached out with one hand,
grabbing it tightly, savoring the pain as the LCL grew saltier in his
mouth.  "Just a little bit longer," he hissed, slamming the fist down
over and over, feeling his self-loathing grow, his thoughts drifting
back towards the girls involuntarily.  "Come on, damn you, break..."

Abruptly, the visual display snapped off into nothingness, the
connection with the Eva suddenly severed, and Neil knew immediately
what had happened, his eyes going wide.  "No," he gasped, distantly
feeling the Eva lurch backwards and slam into the ground, the sound of
the Angel rising once again more than audible through the armor of the
Eva.  "No.  NO!  NO, NO, -NO-!"

Inside the command center, Misato could only gape at the scene, her
view distant but still clear enough to get a clear sight of the Angel
returning to its vertical stance, leering face turning downward to look
at Neil.  There was a single moment of nothingness, then the Angel
lifted Neil's Eva, the golem's arm still clutching the beast's metallic
whip tightly enough for the Angel to hurl the boy beyond where Misato
could see.  "Makoto, place the display of the main screen on one of the
side walls!" she shouted, turning towards the least-damaged wall as
Makoto nodded and keyed in a quick sequence of commands.

The Angel's eyes flared for only a moment before letting a powerful
blast explode across the chest of the purple machine, sending it flying
backwards into one of the sides of the Geo-Front, fingers sliced off as
the whip tore through the hand that held it tight.  Misato felt herself
grow weak as she realized that the Angel had exposed the Eva's core,
and a surge of panic went through her as the Angel began to lash its
whips against the surface of the core, sending cracks along it.  "Neil
was still synchronized with the Eva when it shut down," she gasped,
taking a step forward.  "Come on, Neil, do something."

"MOVE, DAMN YOU!" screamed Neil, his arms working the handrests
desperately, slamming the mock controls forwards and back, a deep pain
striking him across the chest and sending his body into minor spasms
ever few seconds.  "-WORK-, damn you!  Come on!  You need to destroy
the Angel!"  He was sobbing now, blonde hair drifting through the
bloody sea around him in front of his eyes, his mind recalling his
silent time within the Twelfth Angel.  "Is that what you want?  I pilot
the Eva because -I- -HATE-!  I'm a -monster-!  Just please, do whatever
you have to to make yourself WORK!"

Neil thrust the handrests forward one more time, then he felt something
touching him from the back of his mind, somthing that felt distantly
like the Eva but somehow different.  Then his eyes widened, and he felt
something new shoot through his heart, a sensation too beautiful to put
into words, and within seconds the world had dissolved into light.

A flare of white light flooded out of EVA-01's eyes, and as the control
room gaped the machine's right arm jerked up and grabbed the
approaching metal whip, letting it lash against the hand as if it was
nothing.  The Angel had only a second to react before the Eva pulled
hard, and to the shock of all those within the control room the whip
came tearing free of the Angel, the Eva discarding the strip of metal
carelessly, its eyes turning a brilliant green as it stood once again.
"T-the Eva has reactivated!" shouted Maya, her eyes turning towards her
console and then widening.  "Synch ratio is at 100%!  There's no input
from the cockpit!"

Everyone found themselves riveted to the display as the Eva reached
forward with its damaged hand, the injured flesh bubbling outward for a
moment before new fingers burst free and grabbed the Angel's other
whip, stunning the beast into stasis as the purple golem's jaws tore
themselves open.  A monstrous roar echoed through the Geo-Front, but
Misato's eyes widened as she realized she recognized the voice, that it
wasn't simply a bestial growl.  "That's Neil voice," she gasped, gaping
as the Eva ripped out the other whip and took it in its hand, forcing
the metal into a makeshift spear before leaping at the Angel.  "It's
lower, but that's Neil's voice!"

The Angel fell backwards as Neil slamed into it, saliva dripping from
the metallic jaws of the Eva, the slitted eyes glowing a brilliant
green as the machine slammed its makeshift weapon underneath the
Angel's face.  What had seemed before to be a leering grin now seemed
like a scream of terror as the purple Eva ripped the spear free, then
jammed its hand in the hole it had torn, letting its fingers force
underneath the bony face.  A horrendous ripping noise filled the air,
the Eva tore off the beast's face, blood spurting up and coating the
purple machine, a grin seeming to creep across the Eva's face as it
tossed the face aside.

Seconds passed in relative silence, the Eva simply regarding its
opponent, the light within the red core beginning to flicker out.  Then
the Eva leaned forward, and the gigantic jaws began to tear out the
flesh of the Angel, the gargantuan mouth taking huge bites out of the
fallen beast as the core dimmed to solid black.  Misato could hear Maya
vomiting behind her as the Eva happily devoured the Angel, blood
washing over its purple faceplate, drawing up only briefly every few
seconds as if for breath.

After what seemed like an eternity of its feast, the Eva reared back
anew, then roared loudly, the voice sounding even more like Neil's as
the Eva tilted its head back.  Blood dribbled down from its would-be
lips, then something surged in its back where the power coupling
normally went, the armor around it sloughing off like so much dead
skin.  "It's repairing itself," gasped Ritsuko, and Misato turned to
see the woman staring in what looked to be a mixture of surprise and
joy.  "He's regenerated his S2 organ.  He's recovering on his own."

"What are you talking about?" asked Misato, turning back towards
Ritsuko fully, her eyes only briefly flicking back to the roaring Eva
on the screen.  "Do you mean Neil?"

Ritsuko smiled in a sort of distant fashion, disturbingly similar to
Gendou's smiles.  "You know that the Evas are clones of the first
Angel," she said, her eyes fixed firmly on the beast on the screen.
"But that's not entirely true.  We needed some way of keeping the
original, and we needed to make sure that it was under control... and
we already knew how to bend the First Angel to our will."

"You mean..."  Misato's eyes hesitantly turned towards the screen, the
Eva roaring at nothing, a cold breeze wafting through the shattered
husk of Central Dogma.  She had always discounted Neil's talk of the
Eva having a mind of its own, but as she stared at the beast on the
screen she realized that it was the same beast that had helped kill her
father, the source of the single event in her life that had haunted her
nightmares.  "Neil's inside the First Angel," she gasped, eyes focused
on the blood-stained monster as it finally returned to a standing
position, the implications whirling in her mind as she stared at the
flashing green eyes of her savior and her would-be destroyer.

                                  ]++[

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:
             Far away lies the loved one.
             Far away lies the hated one.
             Far away lies the conflict.
NEON EPOCH EVANGELION 19: MAKING PEACE WITH DISTANCE
"What's lying underneath your words?  What are you -really-?"

                                  ]++[

We only have a little time in our lives to waste.  Make the most of it.
Electronic Transcendence Productions: http://www.lostfactor.net
Producer of, um, stuff for an unspecified time-period.
Rants: http://www.livejournal.com/users/lostfactor

From - Sun Dec 29 10:50:41 2002
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Subject: [Eva][FanFic] Neon Epoch Evangelion: Episode 18
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I want you to join the mercenary unit "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.

Okay, folks - as warned, there will be a lag in NEE's posting.  Next
week, there will be -no- episode posted.  Really.  Nothing, nada,
zilch, zero, zip.  Don't go looking for it, it won't be there.  I'll be
back home and devoid of Internet access, so it'll be conspicuously
absent.  There will - hopefully - be a new episode of the series up two
weeks from today, but in the worst-case scenario one will get posted on
the 6th or so of January.  Sorry, but there's really nothing I can do
about it.

On the other hand, there -will- be some special fiction posted to
http://www.lostfactor.net on Friday as an early Christmas gift... but
it's not NEE.  (The temptation to do the Tokyo-3 Christmas Special has
thankfully been repressed.)  Still, you might enjoy it - it does
involve lots of gunfights.

                                  ]++[

               ]+ ELECTRONIC TRANSCENDENCE PRODUCTIONS +[
                                presents

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

                  ]+ EPISODE 18:  DREAD COUNTENANCE +[

                     By Eliot "Lostfactor" Lefebvre

             Based off of "Shin Seiki Evangelion" by GAINAX

                                  ]++[

His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes
were like blazing fire.
- REVELATIONS 1:14

                                  ]++[

Misato's hand gently touched the white bandage wrapped about her head,
strips of gauze wrapping around her skull and just barely managing to
avoid covering her eyes, her fingertips coming back without blood on
them as a minor relief.  She could remember when she had been found by
the rescue party, how she'd been pronounced "fine" over the radio as
soon as it was seen that she could walk and that she was entirely aware
of her surroundings and circumstances.  The horribly loud noise of the
helicopter's rotors and the bandage patching up the wound on the back
of her head, however, spoke less to the initial assessment and more to
the fact that she was not fine at all.

Her eyes flicked across the passenger chamber of the helicopter towards
Ritsuko, the woman asleep, her left arm cradled in a sling with the
tips of a splint protruding from it.  They had, from what the rescue
squad said, been among the lucky ones, on the absolute edge of the
blast radius when the Angel had first attacked, spared anything but the
weakest of blows.  That blow alone had been more than enough to tear
apart the observation station and send she and Ritsuko tumbling along
the ground for at least ten meters, and she had known enough of what
had happened to realize that the lucky ones were about the only ones
that would escape without being dead or permanently disabled.  Of
course, she would argue that the truly lucky ones were the technicians
that had been in a similar situation, as they didn't have to be air-
lifted back to Central Dogma immediately.

"We never really thought about it," she muttered to herself, turning
her head to stare out the window at the trail of destruction that the
Angel had left.  Crews were already hard at work trying their best to
clean up the devestation, a task that they were poorly equipped for in
light of the destruction the beast had wrought.  "We always just
assumed that we'd be inside of the Geo-Front when an Angel attacked.
We thought that the armor would be enough, that we could lock ourselves
away from danger."  She paused, flicking her gaze towards Ritsuko,
wishing momentarily that she had a conscious audience at the very
least.  "That's what we get for trusting technology with our lives."

A beep came from beside her, and Misato glanced down at the unfamiliar
cellular phone, its screen flashing that she was being contacted.  Her
own phone had gone largely unused except in emergencies, but it had
been more than crushed in the explosion, and so one of the field staff
had provided her with a new one until she was able to request another
from Commander Ikari.  She'd not been informed that anyone would have
the number, although she supposed that it could have someone for the
technician.  Shrugging, she flicked the phone on and lifted the gauze
around the nearest ear, putting the phone against it.  "Major Misato
Katsuragi speaking."

"It's good to hear your voice again, Major," replied Makoto, his voice
slightly distorted by the static of the phone but still recognizable.
On the other side of the helicopter, Ritsuko stirred slightly from the
noise, awakened by the sounds of voices.

Misato briefly considered trying to let her friend get more rest, but
she knew that the top priority was to get a clear picture of what had
happened against the Angel.  "Makoto.  God, it's good to hear your
voice."  She paused, biting her lip, resisting the urge to cry as she
realized it was the second time that an Angel had nearly killed her,
that she'd been saved only by pure luck this time instead of her
father's naturally paranoid tendencies.  "We're on our way to Central
Dogma.  The crew said that the Thirteenth had been engaged when they
found us.  What's the situation?"

"Um... the Thirteenth was destroyed slightly after we heard the news
about your safety," replied Makoto, an awkward stutter in his voice
letting Misato know that something was wrong, something she didn't want
to talk to him about.  "EVA-00 and EVA-05 were damaged in the battle."
He paused again, and Misato could hear the young man swallowing hard.
"Neil... EVA-01 destroyed EVA-03.  It's gone.  Over the Henflick Limit
by several thousand orders of magnitude, and even if it wasn't I doubt
we'd be allowed to repair a former Angel."

"There's something you're not telling me," said Misato flatly, crossing
her legs as best she could with the myriad scrapes and bruises along
them, further keepsakes of her battle with the Angel that hadn't
merited the same level of attention as the wound on her head.  "What
else happened with the Angel?"

Again, Makoto could be heard swallowing hard in the background,
obviously doing his best to skirt the issue, giving Misato the barest
idea of what he might be hiding.  "We... we tried to eject the pilot
from EVA-03, but we weren't able to.  The Angel held in the entry
plug."  He paused for a moment, taking a deep breath.  "During... after
the battle, EVA-01 took the entry plug and..."  There was silence.  "He
crushed it.  Like a bug."

Misato was stunned into silence, her mouth trying to move in reaction
but doing nothing but mouthing at the air uselessly.  At length she
shook her head, the beat of the rotors outside seeming to grow louder,
her eyes flicking briefly back out the window towards the nightmarish
carnage that the Thirteenth had left in its wake.  "How..."  She
paused, then tried again, struggling to wrap her mind around the news.
"Is Vash alive?"

"Barely," replied Makoto weakly.  "The Eva isn't meant to take on human-
sized opponents, and the entry plug was designed to be crush-resistant,
after all.  But between the damage from Neil's... -thorough-
destruction of Vash's Eva, the neural feedback caused by the takeover
by the Angel, and being crushed and discarded... he's in a bad way."
He paused, then sighed loud enough for the phone to pick it up.  "The
doctors are doing everything they can, but he might lose his left arm,
and at the moment it looks like he might not walk again."

"Christ almighty," muttered Misato, flicking her eyes towards Ritsuko,
seeing the concern on the other woman's face.  She momentarily wondered
if it was the right time to let the other woman know what was going on,
but with a quick roll of her eyes she realized that Ritsuko would
probably handle it better than she had.  "Hold on a second, Makoto."
Taking a deep breath, she moved the phone down, pressing it against her
chest, feeling another bruise that she was glad the rescue team hadn't
felt for as she stared into Ritsuko's blue-gray eyes.  "The Thirteenth
was neutralized.  EVA-03's entry plug got crushed."

True to form, Ritsuko barely batted an eyelid at the news, apparently
unworried by the statement.  Misato couldn't help but be a little angry
at the woman's cavalier attitude, thinking of what it must have been
like for Vash inside the sea of blood-scented LCL, wondering if it had
been anything like Neil's experience.  "Is he alive?" asked Ritsuko
flatly, forcing herself back into a sitting position with her good arm,
obviously resentful of her own frailty.

"At the moment," replied Misato, suddenly losing all desire to continue
talking to her former friend, bringing the cell phone back to her ear
and flicking her eyes back out to the scar of dirt and ice that
stretched across the landscape.  "Sorry.  Ritsuko just woke up."  She
paused, unsure of which of the Children to ask more about first,
wondering about Neil even as she felt a minor pang of regret for not
being more concerned with Vash.  "Has EVA-01 been recovered yet?"

"We're working on it.  The machine..."  A pause came from the other
end, the same as before, as though Makoto was hiding something from
Misato.  "We think the machine -might- have gone berserk.  It's hard to
say, though.  We lost all contact within the machine, but it didn't
seem about to berserk when it shut off from us..."  He paused, sighing
heavily, and Misato felt an almost tangible sense of disorientation, of
being shoved into the middle of the situation without any understanding
of what was going on.  "Everyone's wondering if Neil crushed the plug
intentionally or not.  Nobody wants to think that he did, but from what
little information we have..."

"I understand," Misato interjected, feeling in the back of her mind
that there were no two ways about the problem, that the day had already
been too horrific for the best-case scenario to have any chance of
holding up.  And she knew, as well, that she didn't want to deal with
it, that she wanted to be able to fly back pretending that everything
would be fine, that she could go home to her little surrogate family
without any crisis.  It was the first time in a long while that she
found herself truly missing the arms of a lover, that all she really
wanted was someone to hold her and console her instead of being forced
to console others.  "Fill me in when I get there.  Hopefully, EVA-01
will be back in the docks by then."

Before Makoto could say another word, Misato let her thumb press
against the button to end the call, hearing an approving chirp from the
phone to let her know that it had terminated the connection.  Sighing,
she flicked her eyes quickly over to Ritsuko, then placed the phone
down on the slightly-padded bench of the helicopter as she turned back
towards the gash in the landscape, technicians and vehicles visible
about it like flies swarming to an open wound.  Though she knew that
she didn't have the whole story about the battle with the Thirteenth
Angel, she already wasn't looking forward to eventually dealing with
it, and more than anything she wanted to simply turn the helicopter
away towards a destination with less emotional investment.  Another
sigh passed her lips as she let herself focus on the steady beat of the
rotors above her, the even and reliable noise as they cut throught the
air.

Then the phone rang again, and Misato jumped slightly, her eyes
flicking away from the window towards the small phone immediately.  She
paused for a second, letting it ring again, terrified and excited at
the thought that it was Makoto calling again with more news, news that
she knew could neither be good nor bad.  Closing her eyes momentarily,
she reached out and grabbed the phone, flicking it open with her thumb
and pressing it to her ear.  "Major Misato Katsuragi speaking," she
said, aware that her voice had a vague tremor in it now.

"Misato, thank God.  I thought that one of the morons in the tech
center had given me the wrong number for a second."  Nieve's voice hit
Misato unexpectedly, and for a second she flicked her eyes back towards
Ritsuko before she recognized the girl's tone.  "I was trying to reach
you before, but I kept getting a busy signal."

"I was on the phone with Makoto," replied Misato, her mind slowly
processing the fact that the girl couldn't possibly be doing well under
the circumstances.  For the barest of moments, she paused and let
herself entertain the fantasy that the girl had called her as a sort of
surrogate mother, that she wanted to hear Misato's voice again to know
that everything was going to be all right.  "What's happening down
there right now?  Are you all right?"

"Fine," replied Nieve, her voice giving her away.  "I'm a little wet
and bruised from the hail, but I'm entirely healthy."  She paused, and
Misato knew that the girl was going to ask her something, adding some
minor fuel to the woman's slightly-guilty fantasy.  "Misato... when
Neil is recovered in the Eva, you're going to be going in to see him.
I... I want to come, too.  Eiko and I both want to come with you."

"I see," replied Misato, speaking more as a stalling tactic than
anything else.  She was almost certain that Nieve wouldn't feel any
better if she was there, that it might actually make the girl's
situation much worse, but she also didn't want for the girl to be lying
in terrified wait.  She knew what that was like, knew that it wasn't
fair to Nieve to make her go through it.  "Are you sure that's a good
idea?  You might not like what you find out."

Nieve's voice was silent for a moment, and Misato suddenly had the
sense that the young girl was planning something very different than
what Misato had originally envisioned.  "I need to be there, Misato.
I... I just have to."  She paused, the sound of an intake of breath
cutting through the phone's static and then petering out, as though
she'd given up on the effort.

Sighing, Misato shook her head, knowing that the girl wanted to believe
that Neil hadn't done anything wrong.  It was something she was dealing
with personally, but the urge to believe was tempered by the
apprehension of the consequences if she was wrong, and despite herself
something told her that she was wrong despite everything.  "All right,"
she said, knowing that her voice was giving her away, in no state to
try and mask her emotions.  "We'll all go down to EVA-01's hangar
together."  She paused.  "Take care of yourself, Nieve."

The phone clicked off without an answer, and Misato sighed, her eyes
somehow drawn back to the devestated strip of land left by the Angel,
as though in the wake of everything else it was perverted into a
comfortingly stable feature.  To say that it was disturbing would have
been understating the situation, but Misato still let her eyes rest on
it, even as she noticed Ritsuko moving out of the corner of her eye.
"You're trying to believe in him, aren't you?" she asked softly, the
barest hints of an emotion creeping into her voice but masking
themselves too well to be identifiable.

"Would you rather we gave up on all of them?" replied Misato, her voice
harsher than she'd intended, slapping Ritsuko into silence.  Misato let
her gaze creep slightly towards Ritsuko to see the woman remaining
completely silent, then she sighed and let her eyes fall back to the
gash of land, her heart heavy with the weight of her circumstances.

                                  ]++[

Neil's memories were groggy as he felt the Eva move towards the hangar,
his video feed shut off, the LCL tasting more sharply than ever of the
unique salt of blood, his hands clenched in tight fists as he stared at
the blackness of his monitors.  In the back of his mind, he felt the
nagging question of whether or not he was truly groggy or not, whether
or not he simply wanted to be unable to remember what he had done
because it made it wasier to live with what he had done.  But those
thoughts were being pushed from his head as soon as he became conscious
of them, his entire mental ability being focused on the steady rush of
LCL in and out of his lungs, the dim orange swirls about his emerald
eyes.

Though Misato had no way of seeing Neil's eyes, she would have argued
that there was a disturbing amount of versimilitude between his eyes
and the flashing look on Nieve's eyes, focused on the machine as it
slowly moved into the hangar, demonic armor streaked with the blood of
EVA-03.  She was obviously trying to look strong, standing further
forward than Misato or Eiko, as though she was trying to intimidate the
massive machine while the teal-gray walls closed in around them.  "Are
you sure you're all right, Nieve?" asked Misato, her voice soft,
something in the back of her mind and the bottom of her heart making
her painfully aware that what was about to happen would not be good.

"I'm fine," Nieve lied, staring at the Eva as it lurched to a halt, the
restraints beginning to snap shut around it, a fitting gesture after
the savage display it had made on the surface.  She was resisting tears
with all her strength, forcing herself to remain in control even as it
tore her apart from within, knowing that it would do no good to cry as
the jets of the nutrient bath began to activate.  Her course was set,
her thoughts reconciled, and she knew that if she simply said it to
herself enough times she would more than believe it.  "I just need to
see him."

Silence reigned over the voices for a moment, the only noise that of
the nutrient bath swirling loosely about the bottoms of EVA-01's feet.
Then there came the distinctive noise of the Eva's back hinging open as
the entry plug slid out, a crane retrieving the plug as it flushed out
the LCL and the back of the machine closed once again.  A few more
restraints slid into place around the Eva as the entry plug swung
towards the catwalk slowly, agonizingly slowly, finally setting down
after what seemed like an eternity.

Neil reached up and gently pushed the hatch of the plug open, knowing
full well that it would not be enough to open the hatch.  He couldn't
know for certain what awaited him outside of the plug, but a hissing
voice in the back of his mind warned him that it would be bad.  The
hatch, unsurprisingly, remained shut, and for a moment he considered
remaining within the plug, simply waiting for the next time that NERV
decided he was necessary.  Gritting his teeth, he pushed again, letting
the hatch swing open, the fluorescent light from the teal-gray hangar
flooding in like a cold bath.

A moment passed before Neil found the strength to climb out of the
plug, the sheer impact of the situation not lost on him as he stepped
out onto the catwalk, Misato, Nieve, and Eiko all assembled before
him.  All four remained quiet as the plug closed again and was moved
off of the catwalk, LCL dripping slowly from the boy's body and
sloughing down into the nutrient bath harmlessly.  His vocal cords felt
choked by the blood-liquid that he had sat in, and something from his
memory tugged at his heart, tried to leap from his mouth into the open
air even as he tried to rein it in.

"You destroyed the Thirteenth Angel," Misato said at length, unable to
wait any longer, wanting to know the horrible truth right away instead
of letting it simply hang in the air.  The boy stared for a moment,
then nodded weakly, some unimaginable hurt showing behind his eyes,
only serving to deepen Misato's unspeakable terror about what she would
learn about him.  "Nobody's even confused about that.  But you crushed
the entry plug afterwards, after you'd disemboweled the machine.  Why?"

"I didn't," replied Neil, his voice sounding oddly hollow and
shellshocked, devoid of any of the emotion that any of the assembled
people knew to expect from him.  He wanted to frown, to feel angry,
sad, happy, perturbed, frustrated, something other than simply blank,
but something was keeping him from it, keeping him from being convinced
by his own words.  "I lost control of the Eva.  It crushed Vash's plug
without me."  He knew that his voice should sound something other than
emotionless.  He should be sad.  Why couldn't he feel sad?  "Is he all
right?"

Nieve stepped forward before anyone could say anything, her motions
slow and awkward, feet falling irregularly and causing her path to sway
gently from side to side as she approached the boy.  His eyes fixed
blankly on hers, and had Misato been able to see her eyes she would
have seen the same thing on her face, not that she doubted it was there
regardless.  Moments passed this way, her steps bringing her within
arm's length of Neil, and everyone seemed to hold their breaths as
Nieve reached out her arm, letting her hand touch Neil's cheek gently,
cradling the curve of the boy's face, his expression beginning to melt
ever so slightly.

Then Nieve's body lurched into action, the hand seeming to move in slow
motion as it lifted away from the boy's cheek momentarily, then
swinging immediately back into it with a loud crack, whipping Neil's
head to the side as the cracking noise of the slap echoed through the
chamber.  Nieve remained frozen in position for a moment, her breaths
obviously coming harder, and Neil could see from the corner of his eye
the same enraged sorrow that he'd seen the day they had first made love.

"You're a monster," she hissed, her eyes not flashing with anger so
much as utter disgust.  A dull ache was growing between her legs, and
she couldn't help but feel as though she'd been dirtied, as though
Misato and Eiko were both seeing her as some kind of Babylonian whore.
"I regret every second that I spent on you, every time that our lips
found each other, every second that I let myself believe for a second
that you were even -human-.  I regret -everything-."  Tears were
streaming down her face, and she stared at the boy harshly, feeling an
emptiness inside her as he remained frozen, unmoving, still reeling
from the slap.  "Don't touch me again.  Don't come -near- me."

Neil's eyes fluttered shut, and Nieve felt her tears redoubled, felt
the abandonment that had been eating away inside of her begin to claw
with greater ferocity, the cruel joke of existence finding an even
better punchline.  The moment was frozen in time before Nieve pushed
past Neil and began running out of the hangar, tears streaming from her
face, only the most distant vestiges of control remaining on her body
as the door hissed and whirred as it opened and closed.  If Neil had
gone comatose from the slap, everyone would have believed it, his body
remaining rigid and his eyes remaining shut.

Only Eiko and Misato remained, and something was obviously bothering
Eiko as well as she stepped towards the boy, her eyes wide, her mouth
half-opened, one hand brought up near her mouth and the other wrapped
around her midsection.  She brought herself within an arm's length of
Neil, but she lacked the decisiveness to slap the boy, could only gape
as he remained unmoving.  Neil said nothing as she too moved past him,
following after Nieve, obviously just as disgusted and conflicted as
Nieve.

The door whirred and shut behind Eiko, leaving just Neil and Misato in
the room, the steady sound of the rushing nutrient bath substituting
for words between them.  "Neil," she said softly, trying to snap the
boy back into action, taking a step towards him.  She still wanted to
believe what he had said, but it was becoming more and more difficult
with each passing second.  "Neil, talk to me.  Please."

"Let me speak to Commander Ikari."  The words had a decidedly different
tone to them than his flat speech before, now tinged with obvious
sadness, tears beginning to trickle out from behind his eyes.  Misato
recoiled slightly, surprised, but Neil slowly turned his head to face
the woman, letting his eyes open, bloodshot and a brilliant green.  "I
need to talk with him immediately."

Misato paused, biting her lip.  The last thing that she wanted was to
let Neil talk to the man, knowing full well what Neil was going to say,
that there was no possible way he would be willing to keep her few
traces of a family together any longer.  But she also knew that keeping
him from the commander would only hurt him further, and she'd learned
that she didn't want to hurt him, that she wanted to let him find some
kind of release.  It was the mental equivalent of an irresistable force
meeting an immovable object, and a few minutes passed in silence,
Neil's tears running down from his face and mingling with the dripping
LCL, falling down into the bath of liquid that fed the Eva.  At length,
she shook her head, then turned on her heel, beginning to walk down the
catwalk towards the command center.  "I'll tell him that you need to
see him.  Get changed, and I'll meet you outside of the locker room."

Neil was alone again, with no onlookers but the merciless purple Eva, a
sight that was spared only a curosry glance as the boy stared around at
the empty room.  The touch of Nieve's hand had snapped him back to his
senses, to the horrible realization that he had been unable to avoid no
matter how much he wanted to.  "The Eva didn't do anything I didn't
want it to," he gasped, tears redoubling and vision blurring as he
looked back towards his machine, knowing full well what he had to do.
"Niobe was right.  God damn me, she was completely right."

A weakness overtook the boy's knees, and he fell into a kneeling
position, his hands folded over his eyes to buffet the tears as he
leaned back, wailing at nothing.  The Eva simply stared as the boy
kneeled as though in prayer, his cries of sorrow and anguish filling
the chamber, echoing off the teal-gray metal walls and the stoic gray
jaws of the Evangelion.

                                  ]++[

It had been perhaps half an hour since Neil had told Misato that he
needed to speak with Commander Ikari, but it felt like years, as though
he had needed to spend al,l of the interceding time learning to shut
himself off.  He had managed to regain control over himself since he
had started crying, and he stood across the room from the commander
managing to look calm, wearing the same blue shirt that he'd come to
Tokyo-3 in, his eyes fixed on the commander as the red light of the
office glossed over both of them.  "Neil Richelieu," said the commander
curtly, his voice flat and emotionless.  "You claimed you needed to see
me."

"Yes," replied Neil, forcing himself to feel nothing, to simply stare
at the light-obscured eyes of the commander and let his mouth form the
words, not to let himself cry again.  "I need to talk to you about.."
He trailed off, trying to start over, to phrase his case better.  "You
certainly saw what happened against the Thirteenth Angel."

"Of course.  You destroyed it and made certain that it was dead.
Excellent work."  The commander reached and adjusted his glasses, then
tented his hands in front of his mouth once again, the distance and the
eye-bleeding light more that sufficient to prevent Neil from picking up
any facial cues from the commander.  "What about it?"

"Commander..."  Neil paused, then shook his head, not wanting to
explain emotional reasoning to the commander, doubting that it would
make any sense to the man in the first place.  It looked as though the
commander had long ago stopped paying attention to emotional urges, and
Neil felt more than a little disgusted with himself without thinking of
the emotions of what he had done.  "Commander, I don't think it's right
for me to pilot the Eva any longer.  I have reason to believe that I
may be a danger to myself and to my fellow pilots."

"Nonsense.  You attacked a known threat and dealth with it
appropriately."  There was no resignation in Gendou's voice, and for a
brief moment Neil wished that he could blame the whole mess on the
silent maliciousness of Ikari, that it was somehow out of his hands.
But he knew better, and even as the commander stared at him he knew
that Dr. Ikari's uninvolved attitude had hardly turned Neil into a
monster.  "Nothing that you did was outside of what a normal operation
would have done.  I have no reservations about sending you into combat
again."

"I'm aware of that.  -I- have reservations about sending myself into
combat again."  Neil's voice had taken on a sharp edge, a tone that he
might not have been willing to take with the commander if he had
retained any intention of remaining with NERV.  "Whatever you say, I
didn't have to nearly kill Vash just to destroy the Angel.  I know
that."  He paused for a moment, lowering his hand slightly, one hand
twitching itself into a fist.  "Even if you don't approve, I can leave
the organization whenever I decide.  I have responsibility for my
actions, and that includes preventing them."

Gendou simply stared at Neil for a moment, showing no reaction to the
boy's harsh words other than a vague amusement.  "Very well," he said
after a moment, remaining stationary.  "You will be forced to vacate
housing with Major Katsuragi, and a transport plane back to America
will be arranged by mid-afternoon tomorrow.  You may arrange for
transport of your belongings and accomodations for tonight.  Once you
leave, you will be closely monitored to ensure that you reveal no
confidential information such as the nature of the Second Impact or the
Evas, and you will no longer be allowed inside any NERV facilities.
Are you certain about this?"

Despite himself, Neil couldn't stop the tears from streaming down his
face, soaking into his shirt as he lowered his head further, everything
in his being protesting his actions.  But he knew that he had no
choice, that if there was no other way to control the horrible monster
that he was then his only option was to remove himself from the
situation.  "I believe that I am more of a threat to the human race
than the Angels.  I'm certain."

"A message will be placed with the upper-level staff.  Meet with them
and they will deal with the removal of your personal ID and all other
important information relative to NERV.  You will leave the facility as
a private citizen once again."  He paused briefly, expression and
position never faltering, the shadows crouched around him seeming to
grow darker.  "In the event that the situation becomes too desperate,
NERV may call on you again, but that would require the death of all
remaining Children.  For all intents and purposes, your career as a
pilot has ended."

"Thank you, sir," Neil choked out through a haze of tears and
suppressed sob, turning and walking as swiftly as he could towards the
exit.  He hadn't wanted to admit it to himself, but NERV had become his
life in a way that he'd never expected, had grown to define who he was
and where his place was in the world like nothing else in his life.
But he had no alternatives, and he knew that there was no way for him
to continue piloting EVA-01, not after what he had done to Vash.
Struggling to maintain the barest veneer of composure, he let the door
open in front of him for what he knew to be the last time, his tears
only growing as it whirred shut behind him.

Gendou remained stationary in his seat, simply watching the empty space
where Neil had been moments earlier as if the boy was going to return
and beg for Gendou not to remove him from NERV, protesting that he'd
made a mistake.  Instead, he could hear the soft padding of bare feet
behind him, his silent observer finally stepping forward.  "You are
letting him go?" she asked, tone flat and emotionless, the light note
that it hit the only indication of her identity.

"Neil is not on as specific a timetable as you and your brother,"
replied Gendou, unmoving, resisting even the urge to flick his eyes
sideways towards the girl.  "He may well be easier to deal with once
the first stage of the project has been completed."  He paused,
allowing himself a thin and bitter smile.  "Besides, the less there is
for SEELE to suspect, the better we look under scrutiny.  I see no
reason to force him to stay."

"I understand," replied the girl in the same flat tone, as though she
truly could care less about the outcome of events, simply interested in
the entire issue as an academic activity more than anything.  Gendou
let the smile remain on his face as he flicked his eyes towards the
girl, knowing that he had only a short time to wait before he was ready
to move forward with his own goals.  For her part, the girl seemed not
to notice, simply staring into the distance emotionlessly, almost as
though someone had bound an atomoton into flesh.

                                  ]++[

More than anything else, Nieve wanted to cry.  She didn't want to get
up, didn't want to get dressed, didn't want to read or talk to Misato
or bother to eat.  She wanted to lay in bed and cry, let her tears soak
through her pillow, let everything bleed away in a forest of sobs as
she thought about the last words that she'd said to Neil, knowing that
it would be the last time that she'd ever see him, wishing that he'd
done somthing differently the day prior.  But somehow she'd managed to
keep herself running on some sort of autopilot through the morning,
rising as usual, getting dressed, eating breakfast, blankly watching
television in a language she didn't understand and didn't want to
understand, waiting for something that she couldn't put into words as
the pale yellow walls of the apartment watched her harshly.

Now she was eating lunch, under the definition that putting together a
sandwich and staring at it with tears in her eyes qualified as eating.
She knew that she needed to eat, knew that simply looking at the
sandwich was starting down the same road that she'd spent so much time
trying to turn away from, but it seemed like a herculean effort to even
watch the food, much less actually eat it.  The limp white bread and
slowly-spreading jelly seemed to be of the same mind as her, sitting on
the white porcelain plate as though depressed, waiting for Nieve to eat
it but not particularly looking forward to the process.  "I don't want
this," she muttered to herself, slumping forward slightly and propping
herself off the table with her elbows.  "What's the point of eating?
Why should I bother?"

Her words snapped her mind to attention, and she only stared at the
sandwich for a moment longer before she slumped fully against the
table, sobs wracking her body, tears pooling about her face and
mingling with her dissheveled red hair.  "All I wanted was for him not
to leave me," she muttered through a mouthful of tears and choked
gasps, her arms circling her head as she remembered the blank look on
Neil's face, as though he didn't care that she was leaving.  All she'd
wanted was to know that he wanted her, for him to take her no matter
how she tried to hurt him.  But he'd done no such thing, simply
listening to her and then letting her go, unconcerned by her
departure.  "I wanted him to love me," she muttered, her words almost
absorbed by her wailing cry, yellow walls dispassionately surrounding
her and seeming to close in as she sobbed.

Then a knock came at the door, as sharp as it was unexpected, drawing
Nieve's attention after a moment more of crying.  She lifted her bleary
green eyes to the door, tears still dripping down onto the wood of the
table, and in the back of her mind she hoped that simply not moving
would be enough to convince the person at the door to leave.  Then she
wondered if it might be Neil, and hoping against hope she pushed back
from the chair and stood, distantly noting that she was wearing the
same green dress that she'd wore on the day she had met Neil, walking
slowly and irregularly towards the door.  "I'm coming," she called,
wiping away her tears, trying her best to look as though she was still
in control, wanting Neil not to see her reduced to her worst as her
hand closed around the doorknob.

A deep breath was pulled into her lungs, then she let the door swing
open to reveal Ryo in the doorway, holding a small paper bag and
standing with his usual rigidity.  "Ryo," she muttered, feeling her
heart sink at the boy's presence, wishing still that it was Neil.
"Come in, I guess.  Misato's not here, so you'll probably want to leave
soon."

Ryo couldn't identify the feeling that was tugging at his chest,
knowing little beyond the fact that it wasn't pain despite feeling
vaguely painful.  He watched Nieve idly as she turned and walked back
towards the table, her dress swaying about her smooth legs, red hair a
mess but still undeniably attractive, and he forced himself to ignore
her movements and follow routine, kicking off his shoes in the small
foyer area before stepping into the apartment, bag swinging besides him
and lightly tapping against his side.  "Aren't you supposed to be in
school?" she asked, her tone bored, obviously asking the question out
of routine.

"Commander Ikari pulled me out of school temporarily," he replied, idly
wondering if he was supposed to disclose the information but not
thinking of any compelling reason not to.  "It's better to focus on the
Angels at the moment."  The statement drew a brief glance from Nieve
before she turned back to her sandwich, and Ryo walked slowly towards
the girl, the same awkward not-quite-pain sensation in his chest as
before.  "How are you doing without Neil around?"

Nieve's body suddenly jerked to a stop, as though Ryo had tried
intentionally to ask her the one question that she didn't want to
hear.  She gritted her teeth as she felt the slow trickle of tears try
to reassert itself, thinking about leaving Neil behind the day before,
about what he must have felt like lying alone in the hotel, without her
arms around him.  "I'm fine," she replied curtly, now definitely
wanting Ryo to leave, unsure of how much longer she could maintain
control over herself under the circumstances.  "Don't you have other
things to do today?  Testing?  Homework?  Practice?"  She let her eyes
flick towards the boy, watching him slowly shake his head in response.
"Why did you come over in the first place, then?"

"I have something for you," replied Ryo, feeling the pain redouble
itself as he lifted up the bag.  Nieve's green eyes moved to follow the
bag, briefly flitting back to Ryo and surveying his bland school
uniform before standing and taking the bag from him tenatively.  She
surveyed the bag now, as though it was going to bite if she opened it,
and Ryo felt another surge of the tense chest pain that wasn't quite
pain, his mind working hard to try and figure out how to alleviate it.
"I thought you might like it.  I've been working on it for a while now,
for you."

Flicking her eyes up to the boy one last time, Nieve tenatively opened
the bag, her mind still entirely focused on Neil and wishing that the
pale boy would just leave.  She didn't dislike him, but he'd picked the
worst possible time, and she knew that almost any other day of the year
she would have simply kicked him out and been done with it.  Her hand
slipped inside, feeling the rough surface of wood brush against her
skin, and curiosity got the better of her as she closed her hand around
the object inside and drew it out.  She wondered about it for only a
moment longer once she'd removed it from the bag, recognizing it as a
small statue of EVA-02, almost a photorealistic replica of her red
machine aside from the dearth of color.  It was photorealistic in a
disturbing sense, though, as though it had been machine-produced
instead of hand-sculpted, and Nieve noticed a few darker blotches on
the surface that gave her momentary pause.

"It's..."  Nieve paused, trying to find a word that described her
reaction accurately, the way that it was well-done to the point of
being disturbing.  Shaking her head, she looked back towards Ryo, the
boy's blank red eyes staring back at her and eerily reminiscent of the
absent color on the carving.  "You... you must have worked hard on
this, Ryo," she said, lost in a sea of still-present sorrow from Neil's
departure and the unmentionably disturbing nature of Ryo's gift.  "Have
you ever had any training in woodcarving?"

Ryo felt another surge of the awkward pain in his chest, and he took a
step towards Nieve, knowing that it was time for him to do something
even though he wasn't entirely sure what that "something" was.  Neil
was out of the picture, meaning that she could no longer love him -
he'd heard more than enough about the way that the two had parted to be
certain of that.  But something still felt wrong, as though he was
making a leap of logic beyond himself, something that he couldn't
derive by routine.  "I thought you would like it," he said, somewhat
softly, knowing that he was supposed to speak softly to someone who
loved him.  The girl's eyes went wide, and unsure of any other elements
necessary he proceeded on to the next step, leaning towards Nieve with
his mouth leading the way.

Nieve only hesitated for a moment before she let her hand fly, striking
Ryo hard across the cheek and sending a crimson flush across the impact
point.  Ryo recoiled for a moment, then turned his head with disturbing
sluggishness back towards the girl, red eyes open and quizzical, as
though he truly had no grasp of what was happening.  "What the hell do
you think you're -doing-?" she snapped, stepping backwards and feeling
her breath starting to come more heavily, awkwardly reminded of the
first kiss that she and Neil had shared.

"Trying to kiss you.  I thought that was what we did now."  He paused,
leaning back into a standing position, head cocked slightly to one side
with a quizzical expression on his face.  "You no longer love Neil,
therefore you're free to love again.  I gave you something.  Don't you
love me now?"

"Why, you..."  Nieve sputtered in anger, tears beginning to puddle
about the corners of her eyes as she remembered the way she and Neil
had parted once again, wanting badly to be alone and cry once again.
Stepping forward, she grabbed Ryo's shoulders and spun him around,
shoving him forcefully back towards the door.  "Get out of here, Ryo.
I don't want to see you right now, and if this is the way you're going
to act to me I don't want you to come around ever again.  Get out."

Pushing his feet out, Ryo tried to stop himself from moving any further
forward, utterly confused as to how the routine had managed to fail.
He quickly went through the steps in his mind, wondering if he'd
forgotten something after all, if there was some detail that he
missed.  "What did I do wrong?" he asked, stumbling down into the shoe
area as Nieve stopped pushing him, turning around to frown at the girl,
his red eyes flicking about the room and trying to pick up on some
hidden visual cue.  "I thought that I completed the routine
successfully.  What did I miss?"

Ryo's gaze burned at Nieve's skin, and she felt a dull ache creeping
through her body as she glared at the boy, as though she'd lost the
ability to even control who came and went.  "Don't you understand
anything, Ryo?  Love isn't some fucking mathematical equation, it's an
emotion, a state of -being-.  I don't fall in love with you just
because you give me some creepy little statuette that looks like it's
mass-produced."  She knew that she was being hurtful again, just like
she had been with Neil, but what made the entire situation even more
disturbing was the fact that Ryo was simply staring at her weakly,
apparently unconcerned with her words.  "Get out of here, Ryo."  He
stared at her, and she slammed her fist against the wall in frustration
and terror, worried that he might try something even as she felt
herself losing control of her tears once again.  "Get out!"

Lingering for only a moment longer, Ryo reluctantly slipped on his
shoes and stepped out the door, a profound confusion flooding his
thoughts as he stepped back into the hallway.  He had thought
everything through, had made sure that he had all of the steps in
place, and yet somehow he must have made a mistake with the routine,
must have failed to do what he had set out to do.  "Perhaps Niobe knows
something," he muttered to himself, doubting that he could speak to any
of the other Children, less concerned with solving the problem than
with the confusion that hung over his mind like a thick veil.  Glancing
once out the bay window in the hallway, he began walking towards the
stairwell that led out of the building, trying to figure out how he had
managed to make a mistake and how he could correct it.

Standing inside the apartment, Nieve could hear the wet plopping noise
of her tears falling against the floor beneath her, and within moments
she sank to her knees, sobbing once again from the horrible
recollections that she'd had with Ryo.  She felt alone, helpless, and
much as she hated to admit it she wanted her mother's arms around her
once again.  "I can't do anything," she muttered, head bowed and tears
streaming forth, running along her skin as she closed her eyes.  "I
just wanted him to stay."

                                  ]++[

It was an antiseptic white room, the sort of color that bled against
the dull fluoresence of the lighting to make the physical boundaries
seem to sort of melt and slough out of their shapes.  Eiko had never
particularly liked the way that hospitals looked, and her dislike had
only grown since her brother had been put into one, necessitating
frequent visits to his bed in the same artificially sterilized tone of
paint.  She'd idly hoped that NERV would have put slightly more
imagination into the way that its infirmary was structured, but as she
stepped into the white room she could see that it was exactly the same,
that if nobody told you it was impossible to remember that you were
underground.

Taking a deep breath and smelling the sharp odor of medicine and
sterilization, Eiko walked towards the bed, the lone spot of color in
the room, pale blue sheets covering a body surrounded by IVs and
monitors, an oxygen mask lying against the face of the slowly-breathing
boy.  Vash's blonde hair was lying limply against the pillow, his eyes
closed as he took in slow, obviously-pained breaths, body moving
slightly against the sheets.  The girl felt a momentary rush of panic,
seeing how weakened he looked, as though the simple presence of another
human being threatened to break him irrevocably.  But she didn't want
to leave him alone, and armed with the memory of the head doctor's curt
acknowledgement of her visitation pass she continued to walk towards
the boy, dressed in a light blue skirt that reached down to her ankles
and a brilliant white t-shirt, an outfit that she knew Vash had always
liked.

Her footfalls filled the room with a new sound, echoing oddly against
the steady rush of Vash's breathing and the regular beeps of the
condition monitors.  Biting her lower lip, she stepped towards the lone
chair placed to one side of his bed, sitting down in it and pulling it
closer to the boy, surveying him briefly.  She had been told that he
might lose his left arm, but from what she could see the lump in the
sheet was still there, meaning either that they'd saved the arm or that
they simply hadn't removed it yet.  A sigh escaped her lips, and
raising her arm she placed it down on his right arm, trying to find his
hand beneath the sheet.

Vash's breaths changed frequency unexpectedly, and Eiko gave a slight
start as the boy's eyes began to flutter slightly.  She watched, trying
to remain calm as he opened his eyes with obvious effort, a weak smile
managing to pull itself across his face beneath the oxygen mask, eyes
concealing an understandable sadness as he stared at the girl.  "Hey,"
he hissed through the mask, cocking his head slightly to the side to
get a better look at her.  "They said I would be getting visitors."

"We're the visitors, dad," she replied, letting a smile creep across
her face as the boy managed a weak laugh, sounding more like a cough
with the steady hiss of the oxygen mask.  Both of the Children remained
silent for a moment, unsure of what to say, as though they both knew
the obvious topic but also were afraid of speaking any more about it
than was absolutely necessary.  At length, Eiko coughed lightly,
glancing over towards Vash's arm once again.  "They were able to save
your arm, I see."

"No, they weren't," replied Vash, sighing slightly as he lifted the arm
from beneath the sheet, an obviously herculean effort in his weakened
condition.  Eiko didn't notice anything different about it at first,
but as she looked closer she could see that it was noticably paler than
she remembered Vash's skin being, far lighter than the skin on his
face, even under the seeping harshness of the fluorescent light.  "The
doctors said that they were able to rebuild the arm from the remaining
tissue.  I only found out about it after I had woken up."  He sighed, a
harsh raspy noise beneath the mask.  "It feels... wrong.  It's my arm,
and I know it, but... I don't know.  They said it wasn't a normal
procedure, and somehow I can tell."

Eiko wanted to cry in lieu of being able to do anything else for Vash,
but instead she simply reached over and touched his arm gently, feeling
the soft skin, devoid of any marks save the IV needle that jutted
roughly out from around his elbow.  "At least you've still got it," she
said, moving her hand away as he dropped the arm back to the sheet, her
eyes wide and brimming with tears despite herself.  "And at least
you'll be okay.  Things could have been much worse."

"You're right," replied Vash, obviously aware that the conversation was
beginning to step into rather dangerous conversational territory, as
though the two Children were stepping around a landmine.  "I was only
distantly conscious up until that point, and I didn't even fully wake
up when the entry plug started moving.  But I remember that it hurt."
His smile became weaker and more bitter, his head turning back towards
the ceiling, blue eyes flicking away from Eiko.  "Kind of ironic, I
suppose.  I was unconscious before, and then Neil comes along and
crushes me right back into unconsciousness."

The girl wanted to force a laugh, but all she could manage was a slight
choking noise, drawing Vash's eyes if not his head back in her
direction.  "I... talked to Neil," she said, unsure of what his
reaction would be, surprised to see that he simply continued staring at
her with the same sort of pained and bitter expression on his face.
"They think that the Eva went berserk, and that's what Neil said,
too."  She paused, struggling to meet Vash's eyes with her own.  "The
Eva probably just thought that you were part of the Eva.  It wasn't
Neil trying to kill you, or anything."

"Of course.  I didn't think he would do something that malicious."
Something in Vash's voice spoke of suspicion, a hidden doubt of Eiko's
words, as though there was something in the background of Neil's
statement that made it impossible to believe.  A silence settled
through the air between the two Children, Vash flicking his eyes back
towards the ceiling, Eiko staring at him and wishing that she could
think of something more to say.  "Shouldn't you be at school today?  I
mean, I know I have an excuse, but..."

"I do have one," replied Eiko flatly, the question itself feeling
vaguely hurtful, as though Vash was resentful of her presence in the
room.  "NERV gave me a pass out of school for the day.  Special
circumstances."  She paused, trying to figure out the best way to
proceed, knowing that she needed to give Vash the news.  "It was Misato
that did most of the work for that.  I think that she's just feeling
kind of sad now, considering everything that's happening."

Vash tilted his head back towards the girl, his breath coming a little
rougher as he stared at her, blue eyes briefly losing their focus
before training once again on the girl sitting at his side.  "What do
you mean?"  He paused momentarily, then began to try and struggle into
a sitting position, shocking Eiko visibly.  "How long have I been down
here?  Are the Angels already destroyed?"

"Nothing so pleasant," replied Eiko, pushing gently down on the boy's
chest, feeling him struggle against her hold, his body unable fight
against even her admittedly limited strength.  He gave up after a
moment, though whether it was out of actual trust or the realization
that he wouldn't have been able to go anywhere even if he managed to
get to his feet.  "You've been down here less than a day.  No,
it's..."  She paused, still unsure of exactly what to say.  "Neil put
in his resignation yesterday.  He's leaving for America sometime this
afternoon."

Silence reigned for a moment, the boy looking at her as though he
couldn't believe her words, testing to see if she was telling the truth
about Neil's departure.  "Oh," he replied at length, sounding rather
weak, turning his head away from the girl and flicking his blue eyes
back towards the ceiling.  "I guess that's for the best, isn't it?  I
mean, he didn't like it here much anyways."

"Yeah," replied Eiko, also sounding entirely unconvinced, folding her
hands uncomfortably on her lap and following Vash's gaze, her eyes
winding up staring at a patch of dull white on the wall.  She felt as
though she was being watched, putting on some kind of elaborate play
for an unseen and unknown audience, a distant sorrow lurking behind her
eyes that Vash would have been able to see had he only looked up.

                                  ]++[

Misato leaned against her car, feeling the warmth of the metal beneath
her skin, wearing her black dress with its thin white piping,
sunglasses on and eyes focused on the door in front of her.  She had
given Neil a specific meeting time, and as she stared at the monolithic
white hotel in front of her, light reflecting off the black-tinted
windows to make the entire building almost seem to radiate, she had
little doubt that he would be meeting her within moments.  In the back
of her mind, she half-hoped that he'd chosen not to meet her, that he'd
lost his nerve as was instead going to simply remain in his room and
refuse to come down.  "But that wouldn't bring him back to NERV," she
muttered, shaking her head and letting her purple hair brush lightly
against the back of her neck.  "Nothing will, not now."

She had already packed some of his things into the bacseat of her car
but knowing without a doubt that she wouldn't be able to unhook the VCR
she'd left it, though she was half-hoping that it would be enough of an
excuse to get Neil back.  She missed the boy already, and it had been a
hard night with only her and Nieve in the house, lonely and empty, made
worse by the fact that Nieve didn't seem to want to talk about what
happened and Misato still wondered if she wasn't in some small way to
blame for the whole thing.  It had shown on her face all day at work,
and Kaji had called her on it, barging into her office shortly before
she was leaving.

"What are you planning on doing?" he'd asked her, leaning up against
one teal-gray wall, the self-righteous smirk finally gone from his face
but his expression still implying that he didn't particularly care.  At
the time, Misato had been upset by his cavalier attitude, but in
retrospect she knew that Kaji didn't have any real reason to be
worried - he didn't know Neil, at least not in the way that Misato
did.  He was simply showing concern for a friend and former lover, just
wondering how Misato was going to deal with it.

As it happened, she didn't think she did a particularly good job
dealing with Kaji, letting herself remain silent after he'd asked the
question for a good few minutes.  "I'm tired of losing people I care
about," she'd said at length, the only explanation that she could come
up with, knowing that it hardly fit the header of a plan so much as a
general desire.  She could remember glancing at Kaji then, half-wanting
him to take her in his arms, to hold her, tell her that everything was
going to be all right, the way that he would have comforted her if she
hadn't driven him away.

Of course, he'd done no such thing, a fact that hadn't surprised Misato
in the slightest.  "None of us want to lose something we care about,"
he'd said flatly, his face turning serious just as he'd turned to
leave, hands shoved in his pockets and back slumped just enough to be
unusual for him.  "Sometimes we don't have a choice about it, though.
Sometimes the ones we care about don't want us to hold on to them.
You've got to respect that, too."

Sighing heavily, Misato adjusted her sunglasses, forcing herself back
to the present as she glanced idly at her watch, unsure if Neil was
officially running late yet or if she was just getting impatient.  He
still had five more minutes by the hands on her watch, and she let out
another sigh as she tilted her head back towards the hotel.  Kaji had
been referring to when she'd asked him to leave, and she'd known that
at the time, but she'd never let herself stop to think about what it
might mean if Neil did the same thing.  Biting her lower lip, she tried
to push the thought from her head, not wanting to deal with the concept
if she could avoid it, not even wanting to acknowledge Neil's departure
as a real possibility.

Then the doors of the hotel swung open outward, and Misato had to force
herself to keep her eyes from widening at the sight of Neil, to keep
herself from dropping to her knees and begging him not to leave.  He
was wearing the same outfit as the day prior, slightly more wrinkled
and dissheveled, his eyes the same blank green as he stepped towards
the car.  A thin bristle of facial hair had sprouted along his face
since the day before, although Misato couldn't be certain if he'd not
shaved out of necessity or a simple lack of motivation.  "This looks
like a nice hotel," she said flatly, drawing his eyes blankly towards
her, wishing that he didn't look quite so dead in the water.  "Must
have cost a fair bit.  You're making good use of the money NERV's
paying you."

"I suppose," replied Neil, casting his eyes to one side as he felt a
burning wetness behind them, forcing himself to continue breathing
regularly despite the temptation to do otherwise.  He had promised
himself that he wouldn't cry, that he would do what he knew was the
right thing with some dignity even if it killed him.  But he knew that
he wouldn't be able to last long, that even with the exhaustion he felt
from the tears of the night before they were still coming again.  "Can
we leave now?  The flight's a long one, and I want to be there as early
as possible."

Misato frowned momentarily, then nodded, opening the pasenger door and
letting Neil step into the car weakly.  She shut the door behind him
and began walking around the back of the car, glancing in quickly to
see him slumped weakly against the seat, remembering the first time
that she'd met the boy.  Taking a deep breath, she squeezed her eyes
closed and forced herself to keep moving, finishing her steps around
the car and sliding into the driver's seat, starting it with the twist
of her keys and letting it begin moving out along the road to the
airport.

For a little while, the steady noise of music from the radio
substituted for conversation between the car's two occupants, the
constant noise of instruments seeming to choke the air and prevent
either of them from speaking even if they wanted to.  Misato would
occasionally glance over towards Neil, flicking her brown eyes at the
boy, but each time he was simply staring out the window towards the
passing scenery, the white buildings and green hills seemingly
plastered next to the black roads.  Neil, for his part, was doing his
best not to cry, feeling guilty and weak for even contemplating crying
more, knowing that he was supposed to be a man and be stronger than the
tears, that cry wouldn't do him any good in the situation.  It was
harder than he'd expected, and it was all he could manage to focus on
the scene whipping past, comitting each square inch to memory, knowing
that he'd never see the city like this again.

At length, Misato frowned, then reached over to the radio and pressed
in on the volume knob, cutting the music off just as it began to reach
a crescendo.  Neil gritted his teeth and turned towards the woman,
still trying to keep his eyes focused elsewhere, and out of frustration
Misato made a quick signal and pulled onto the side of the road,
ignoring the few angry beeps behind her.  "Stay," she said flatly,
turning towards Neil and ripping the sunglasses away from her eyes,
letting the concern flash clearly out of them.  "Don't leave.  Don't go
back to America.  Stay here and keep piloting the Eva.  I won't deploy
you if you don't want to, just... stay here."

Neil bit his lower lip hard, trying to focus on the pain instead of the
woman sitting beside him, knowing that he had to do the right thing
even if it killed him, that he simply didn't have the option of
remaining.  "I can't," he said slowly, wanting to take back the words
as soon as they were out of his lips, wanting to cry on Misato's
shoulder and not have to go back to the way that his life had been.  He
knew that doing the right thing could hurt, but he'd never known that
it could be so painful before.

"Yes, you -can-," replied Misato, her voice becoming more forceful as
she stared at the boy, the blonde hair falling lightly about his head,
green eyes trembling slightly in the light as though he was about to
cry.  "Just come back with me to NERV, and I'll get them to put you
back on the personnel records.  You'll be a pilot again.  If you're
that frightened of the Eva... I don't know, I'll make sure that you
don't see any more action inside the machine."  She could feel the
barely-healed wounds from the day prior burning, wondering if her
injuries weren't as healed as she'd been told or if it was simply a
side-effect of her stress.  "Think about Nieve.  Think about -me-."

"That's why I'm -leaving-," snapped Neil, whipping his head away,
forcing himself to focus instead on something, anything to keep him
from crying again.  He couldn't help but wonder in the back of his mind
if part of his sorrow didn't come from the fact that he was such a
horrible person, that he truly wanted to stay and hurt the others
more.  "Misato, I... I can't be certain about whether or not the Eva
went berserk."  A lie, and he knew it - he had no doubt in his mind
that the Eva had only done what he had wanted to, knew that even when
his thoughts had become hazy in the first battle the machine as
listening to what he wanted underneath everything else.  "I... I... I
don't think that I'm suited to piloting anymore.  I'm afraid...
afraid..."  He trailed off, mouth unwilling to force out the end of the
sentence, his eyes closing tightly and letting a single pair of tears
trickle out.

Misato stared at the boy for a moment longer, eyes wide, trying to
figure out something to say that would convince him that he was still
wanted, some perfect combination of words that would let him know that
he should stay in Tokyo-3.  She wondered, in the back of her mind, if
this was what Kaji had gone through the day that she had left him, if
he'd been certain there was some phrase that would make things all
right again.  "I can't force you, I suppose," she managed at length,
turning back towards the wheel and pulling the car back onto the road,
trying to resist the urge to lean over and take the boy in her arms, to
sort out her own feelings about the situation even as she continued
slowly through the shining white city.

The rest of the ride was made in relative silence, neither Misato nor
Neil willing to reach over and turn the radio back on, resulting in a
tense absence of any sounds save the car's engine and the minor noises
from outside.  Neil remained fixated out the window, his mind devising
horrible punishments for himself as he stared into nothingness, wanting
very much to accept Misato's offer to return and stay in the city,
almost surprised with himself at him it had become his home in such a
short time.  It seemed as though the trip would never end, as if it was
some kind of slow-motion torture through the city, reminding him of
everything he was leaving behind and everything he would miss, the
silence only making everythng worse.

Sooner or later, however, the ride had to end.  Neil knew that, and as
he felt the car ease into a rather definitive stop just outside of the
airport he knew that it was the end of the line, time for him to leave
forever.  "We're here," announced Misato weakly, obviously simply
saying something for the purpose of breaking the silence instead of
needing to convey the information.  Both remained motionless inside the
car briefly, Neil staring out over the gray asphalt of the runway and
Misato staring at the back of the boy's head, then Misato opened her
door and got out, every noise she made echoing inside of Neil's skull.
"Come on, then.  Let's get your stuff unpacked for the jet."

Neil hesitated for a moment, then opened his door and got out, opening
the back door and slowly taking out the neatly-packed boxes from the
backseat.  He frowned almost involuntarily as he unpacked, knowing that
something was missing just from looking at the supplies, his eyes
darting about and trying to figure out what it was as he tried to avoid
looking at Misato or Nieve's neatly-scrawled writing that labeled the
boxes.  "Is everything here?" he asked at length, deciding that there
was nothing wrong with having a last memory of Misato's voice in his
head, resisting the urge to break down and cry once again.

"Almost," replied Misato flatly, grunting slightly as she lifted one of
the heavier boxes and placed it down on the runway, a thin layer of
sweat beginning to emerge on her forehead.  "There were a couple of
things that I left there... like your VCR.  I wasn't sure how to unhook
it."  She paused, taking a sharp breath, knowing that she was grasping
at straws as far as ways to keep Neil in the city went.  "You could
come back and get it, if you like.  Nieve is there, and she probably
wants to say goodbye."

"It's all right," replied Neil, flushing slightly as he remembered the
sting of Nieve's hand across his face, the anger and disgust in her
eyes, the soft feel of her lips and the wonderful electricity that came
from her caress.  He'd been doing his best not to think of her or Eiko
at all since their last encounter, knowing full well that it would only
make the already-difficult farewell nigh-unbearable.  "I have another
one at home.  Maybe after all of this is over, I'll come back and get
it from you.  But this isn't the place for me if I'm not going to be
helping."

Misato let her hands wrap around another box, idly noting that it was
almost the last one, that in a few minutes she would be saying farewell
to the boy that she'd live with for what seemed like an eternity.
She'd known, from the beginning, that goodbyes would come eventually,
that when the Angels were defeated they would all go their separate
ways once again.  NERV would become a research organization once more,
the Children would return to their lives, and she would find other
people and friends, maybe wind up signing on with the UN peacekeeping
forces.  But she'd always thought that it would be under happier
circumstances, something that she'd look forward to.  The sweat from
her forehead began to drip down to her lips as she put the box on the
dull gray runway pavement, tasting salty enough to almost feel like
blood.

Then she heard the sound of the door on Neil's side closing, and she
flicked her eyes back inside to realize that the car was empty.  It had
gone too fast, faster than she'd expected, and she could feel a vague
panic gripping her from within, a knowledge that she no longer had any
time left to convince the boy standing in front of her not to leave.
For his part, Neil was simply staring at her, the vaguest hints of
tears beginning to form at the corners of his eyes.  "I guess this is
it, then," he said weakly, staring at Misato for only a few seconds at
a time before flicking his eyes away towards whatever minor distraction
he could find.  "I'll keep an eye on the news, and all.  Make sure that
you're all doing all right."

A weak nod was the best that Misato could manage as she walked back to
the driver's seat, the keys feeling heavy in her hand, the boy turning
away from her as her high heels clicked against pavement.  He was
closing his eyes, letting the tears begin to seep out from the corners
as he wished that he was in a movie, that something would keep him in
the city, give him a reason not to leave.  He didn't want to leave.
Much as he was afraid of piloting the Eva again, he didn't want to
throw everything he'd built in the city away, no matter how much of a
monster he was.  But his jaw remained set, and as he heard Misato
opening her door he stifled the urge to cry out, knowing that if he
didn't do anything else right he would do this the way he should have
as soon as the Twelfth Angel freed him.

"I believe you, Neil."  The words came from Misato's direction, and he
turned sharply to see the woman standing just outside of her driver's
seat, sunglasses back on, the vaguest trail of a tear visible on her
left cheek.  "Even if you don't believe yourself, I believe you didn't
mean to crush Vash in there."  She paused, lowering her head, feeling
guilty even as she knew that the boy wouldn't get back inside the car.
"You're just children.  It's not fair to entrust you with decisions
about life and death, to force you to grow up before you're ready."  A
momentary pause, and she reached up to remove her sunglasses, letting
Neil stare into her eyes and fixing his gaze in place.  "I trust you
because you're a good person, Neil.  And if you think that you're doing
the right thing... I don't doubt you for a second."

Neil, unable to look the woman in the eye any longer without crying,
closed his eyes and turned his head away, wishing above all that what
she was saying about him was true.  She stared at him for a moment
longer, then Neil heard the sound of the door shutting once again.  For
the barest of moments, he let himself believe that she had closed the
door without her in it, but the illusion shattered moments later as he
heard the engine start, the car pulling gently away from him, turning
around, and driving away from the airport.  Neil simply stood in place,
tears streaming down his face, staining the blue of his shirt darker
tones as he consoled himself with the knowledge that Misato was wrong
about him being a good person.

                                  ]++[

The entire control room had fallen somewhat silent at the sight of the
gigantic black-white beast on the horizon, moving slowly over the
waters near Tokyo-3 towards the fortress city.  There had certainly
been larger Angels, but something about the build of this one simply
seemed to exude power, the white bundles where arms would have been and
an almost laughing bone-white face somehow combining with the huge
black body to make it seem like a messenger of death.  "Fourteenth
Angel on steady approach towards city," announced Makoto calmly, his
fingers dancing across the keyboard, blank readings emerging from each
scan but not slowing his motions in the slightest.  "Still too far out
to get any kind of definite readings.  UN aerodrones should be within
attack range within twenty seconds."

Makoto opened his mouth to speak again, but was cut off by the cool
hiss of the elevator door, and he whirled about to see Misato walking
in swiftly from the elevator, still pulling on her red command jacket
as her heels clicked against the metal of the floor.  "Sorry I'm late.
The alert hit me when I was driving back from the airport."  She
hesitated for a moment, frowning as she remembered the way that she and
Neil had parted, then stepped up to Makoto's console, surveying the
Angel on the main screen.  "This is number fourteen, right?"

"Right.  Nothing solid about its capabilities yet, though."  As the
young man spoke, the awkward forms of the aerodrones began to swarm
about the Angel, and Misato paled slightly as she began to get some
sense of scale from their eerie resemblance to ants besides the beast.
They were firing on the Angel, but it barely even seemed to notice,
letting the tiny octagonal ripples explode across the surface of its AT
Field as it continued moving over the water.  "Looks like a fairly
potent field, though.  Most of them at least pretend to care about the
aerodrones."

"Could just be getting smarter," replied Misato, leaning on the balcony
over the level below, glancing briefly down towards the red tops of the
Magi out of habit before looking towards the Angel again.  She knew
that she had a job to get done, that she couldn't be letting Neil's
departure distract her especially under the circumstances, but it was a
restriction that was easier said than done, and she couldn't help but
remember the way that the tears had been coming out of the boy's eyes
as she left.  "Maya, what's the status of the Children?" she asked
after a moment, shaking her head and turning towards the young woman.

"Everyone's ready except for the Fourth and..."  Maya stopped, her
omission glaringly obvious as she blushed and leaned her head closer to
the console screen.  "Right.  The Fourth might be able to get inside of
an Eva and pilot it, but his doctors don't recommend it."  She paused
for another moment, drumming her fingers along the keyboard and
bringing up another display.  "Dr. Akagi's still supervising the repair
of EVA-00 - the arm has been regenerated to the elbow, complete with
armor plating, but according to her it'll be at least another twelve
hours before the machine is fully ready for operation."

Thinking for a moment, Misato nodded, turning towards Maya and trying
to ignore the young woman's minor slip-up, less out of anger towards
the technician and more out of her own guilt.  "All right.  Maya,
launch EVA-04 and EVA-02 towards the center of Tokyo-3 - until we have
a clearer picture of what the Angel is capable of, I want to make sure
that they're not in any direct danger."  She paused, not wanting to say
that EVA-01 was on standby even though she knew it was, the thought of
someone other than Neil piloting the purple machine mildly repulsive.
"Hold the others on standby."

"Standby?"  Niobe's voice filled the control room, and Misato couldn't
surpress a sigh as the girl's face appeared before her, obviously
distraught at the woman's decision.  "Misato, put me out on the front
lines!  I know that I didn't do so well against the last Angel, but if
you give me the chance I promise that I'll -"

"For the love of God, Niobe, I gave you an order and I expect you to
follow it!" the woman snapped, tilting her head slightly forward out of
frustration, lifting one hand to massage her temple.  "Your machine was
damaged during the battle with the Thirteenth Angel whether you like it
or not, and we don't know if EVA-01 will even activate with you
inside!  Nieve and Eiko are going to the surface, you're on standby
with Ryo!  Is that clear?"

A tense silence settled over the control room as the girl's face
shifted to an expression of obvious pain, lips tight and eyes wide
before the small portrait of her faded into nothingness.  Misato
sighed, still rubbing her forehead, still feeling the thin layer of
sweat lying upon her brow as she leaned forward, the noises from the
battle site with the Fourteenth Angel and the aerodrones hitting her
hears like jackhammers.  "Major?" asked Makoto tenatively, turning his
chair slightly towards the woman.  "Are you -"

"No," replied Misato, shaking her head and knowing full well what the
man was going to ask, the tension of the Angel mingling with her
underlying tension about Neil as she forced herself to take slow and
regular breaths.  "I'm not even close to okay.  But we can't deal with
that right now, can we?"  She smiled bitterly, then shook her head and
forced herself back to a standing position, trying to convince herself
that Neil had made the right decision even as she felt a headache
beginning to slice its way into her brain.  "Launch EVA-02 and EVA-04.
We'll deal with my problems later."

The LCL swirling about her as she moved to face upwards, gritting her
teeth as the Eva began its upwards motion, Nieve couldn't help but feel
a minor twinge of panic, an underlying worry that she wouldn't be able
to defend against the Angel without Neil around.  She wanted to believe
that she wouldn't have any problems, but she felt her confidence lurch
along with her machine as the entire tunnel suddenly shuddered,
whirling her about in the cockpit and filling her mouth with the dull
bloody taste that seemed to always accompany the Eva being injured.
"What the hell was -that-?" she snapped, trying to convert her sadness
into anger, to be productive instead of sad.

On the command level, Misato was staring at flashing damage displays
before she answered Nieve, unable to believe her eyes.  She had known,
on an academic level, that the massive black Angel was getting closer,
but she hadn't believed for a second that it was getting close enough
to attack Tokyo-3.  As she flicked her eyes between the damage display
and the main screen, however, she knew that there was no way to deny
it, that the Angel had proven itself more than capable of being
aggressive.  "That was the Angel," Misato said into the microphone, her
voice trembling through the communication.  "It just blasted the
surface layer of armor.  It... it sheared through ten levels of armor
with a single blast.  Another couple shots like that and we're done
for."

Nieve felt a momentary rush of deeper panic as she and Eiko emerged on
the surface, the sun setting behind the huge black beast, her hands
tight around the handle grips as she thought about what such power
meant in the hands of the Angel.  She wasn't equipped to fight
something like that, and she yearned momentarily for Neil to still be
beside her, for somebody to be protecting her, keeping her safe from
the horrific power of the Angel.  Then she forced herself into action,
her machine springing aside towards the nearest weapon deposit,
retrieving a standard-issue rifle even as she saw Eiko moving in the
opposite direction.  "Eiko, what the hell are you doing?  You're
leaving yourself wide open?"

Eiko was distantly aware of what Nieve was saying, but as she snatched
a pair of handguns from the depot she ignored the warning, more
concerned with the immediate situation than with the academics of the
battle.  She'd seen Neil do it before, the way that he would lose
himself in a battle rage, and she had more than enough anger, enough
rage to direct into the black monstrosity that was slowly turning its
oddly-shaped face towards her.  "This is for Vash, damn you!" she
shouted, letting the handguns fire off as she dashed about the
buidings, her machine a silver shadow flitting about, bullets exploding
against the AT Field with the standard octagonal ripples.  She knew
that all she had to do was focus, was to make herself angrier, that she
could be an Eva pilot, that she wouldn't fail after what the last Angel
had done to Vash.

As Nieve watched, the Angel's eyes flared with brief surges of power,
and an explosion of energy slammed into Eiko's machine, a brilliant
white corona of an explosion that turned the buildings surrounding the
silver machine into nothing more than crumbling black outlines.  Eiko
herself was thrown backwards as the explosion blossomed into the shape
of a cross, her Eva's AT Field gone and black sears covering the
surface of her machine.  "EVA-04 has sustained severe damage!" shouted
Makoto over the radio connection, Nieve gritting her teeth at the sight
of how easily Eiko had been laid out.  "AT Field has been broken
completely, armor at less than .5%!  Machine has gone into emergency
shutdown mode!"

The Angel was looking towards Nieve now, and grimacing the young girl
opened fire, raking the shells against the surface of the Angel's AT
Field, watching the beast's eyes carefully for the flash of light as
she dashed through the buildings, a growing panic in her mind.  She
wanted to have Neil by her side again, and as she saw the quick flash
of light she knew that she was getting sloppy because of it, knew that
she was losing control of her situation all because of one silly boy.
Gritting her teeth more tightly, she flung her Eva to one side as the
same blast of energy erupted from the ground beside her, seeming to
come out of nowhere and slam into her machine even as she tried
desperately to avoid the assault.

It felt as though a sledgehammer had been driven into the side of her
stomach, and Nieve cried out as her machine was sent tumbling though
the air, losing its grip on the rifle as it flew across towards the
foothills of Tokyo-3.  The pilot cursed at the loss of control as she
stumbled to a stop, Eva lying down on one side, the AT field only
remaining at the barest level of power.  "But I didn't fall for that
trick," she snarled, forcing herself back to her feet, turning the red-
white face of her Eva towards the Angel defiantly.  "Is that the best
you've got?  Just that energy blast?"

Nothing happened for a moment as Nieve stumbled to her feet, the Angel
hovering closer but not unleashing another blast of energy.  Then the
two bundles where its arms would have been unfolded swiftly, revealing
two long trailing ribbon-like whips.  Nieve's eyes widened as she
stared at the Angel, the beast lashing the whips quickly against a pair
of surrounding buildings before letting the appendages lash out towards
the girl.  Both struck the Eva at the knees, and Nieve screamed as she
felt her lower legs suddenly go numb, a burning pain shooting through
her body as she felt her Eva fall backwards from the sudden lack of
legs below the knee.

"EVA-02's pilot is going into neural shock!" shouted Makoto, a distant
sound for the girl as the Angel carelessly slashed away her arms,
leaving her lying against the foothills and screaming in agony.  She
knew that she had lost control, that the boy she though she loved had
left her, and that the Angel was about to kill her for her failure, the
LCL choking her nearly to death with the thick taste of blood.  A few
quick lashes from the beast carved away part of the chest armor, and
Nieve was distantly aware of the sight of a large red orb set
underneath the armor of her Eva, the core of her own personal Angel
clone.  Then she looked up to see the Angel's ribbon-arms lunging
towards her eyes and her core, and she screamed.

Makoto may have said something, but it didn't penetrate the girl's mind
as she felt the world suddenly go black and cold, feeling herself
suddenly huddling naked against a cold wet floor.  Tears were streaming
from her face, and she could only sense blackness around her, knowing
full well that she was dead, that she'd managed to fail everyone, that
she'd lost control.  "I did everything wrong," she muttered, letting
the tears fall down her bare skin, the despair feeling like a physical
presence.  "I let mother down."

"You never let me down."  The voice was one that the girl hadn't heard
for what seemed like an eternity, but Nieve forced herself to open her
eyes and look up, her eyes going wide at the sight.  Her mother was
kneeling before her, wearing the same red and orange plugsuit that she
remembered from the day she had died, the suit structured like Neil's
but obviously made for a female body.  The woman was smiling, her short
red hair brushing against her neck as she extended a hand towards her
daughter.  "You made me proud.  Everything you did in this machine made
me proud, Nieve."

Nieve's eyes were wide and disbelieving, but the sense of her mother's
touch against her cheek was undeniable.  "Mother?" she asked
tenatively, reaching out herself, letting herself touch the woman's
cheek, her neck, her hair.  Then the tears began to flow more strongly,
and she launched herself towards the woman, holding her tightly, the
tears an odd mingling of distress and happiness.  "Ma!  You're back!  I
get to see you again!  Oh, Ma, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry about everything
that I did back then, I..."

"We can't talk."  The statement was curt, not angry so much as
decisive, but equally cutting to the young girl as she let herself lean
slightly away from the woman and stare.  Leigh Soryu-Leary's outline
was fading slowly, dissolving into the blackness surrounding both of
them.  "I'm sorry, Nieve.  I'd wanted to talk to you, but this is the
only chance I'll ever get.  The only way that I could keep you safe
from the Angel was to give myself."

The skin against Nieve's fingers was becoming mroe distant, and she
felt the tears quickly changing notes to fully mournful, struggling to
hold her mother tighter.  "No!  Ma, don't leave!  Please, don't leave!
I'm older now, I've got a handle on things!  Whatever's going on, I
promise, I'll save you!  Please, Ma, don't leave me again!"

"I'm sorry, Nieve," replied the woman, her body now almost wholly
ephemeral, enough for Nieve to see clear through the woman.  "But I
couldn't let you die, not here, not now.  I want to thank you, Nieve,
thank you for being my daughter, for riding in this thing with me.
It's been hard for both of us, I know, but we did our best.  I
hope..."  She paused, her voice becoming more distant.  "I know that
you'll become a fine woman one day.  I just wish that I could see it."

"-MA-!"  The scream was shrill, Nieve's arms tightening more until
there was nothing around her, her tears falling into the nothingness
around her as she felt her world seem to dissolve again.  She regained
consciousness in the sea of LCL that was her cockpit, nothing but
blackness and blood-orange liquid surrounding her.  "Don't go, Ma," she
whispered, leaning back against the seat and letting herself cry,
distantly hearing the Angel moving through her twisted wreck of an Eva.

                                  ]++[

Neil had heard the Angel alarm clearly as it had begun to tear through
the city, the wailing siren warning the residents that they needed to
evacuate in preparation for another installment of the ongoing siege
between the great beasts and NERV.  He had chosen to ignore it, to
simply sit at the airport and hear the barking warning without doing
anything, waiting for the plane that would take him out of the country
and back to his real home.  Though it was certainly difficult to block
out the sound of the sirens along with the growing noise of the
aerodrones firing at the thing, he had managed it as best he could,
wrapping himself in a ball of self-loathing.  "I have to not pilot the
Eva again," he'd muttered.  "I'm a monster.  I can't be trusted."

Then he'd heard the sound of the Evas launching, and despite himself
he'd been unable to stay seated, drawn to look towards the battle
between the Angel and the titanic machines out of a sense of guilt if
nothing else.  He had walked as close to the battle as he could get
while still staying inside the airport, giving him a mostly-clear view
of the battle, the massive black Angel towering over EVA-02 and EVA-
04.  His heart had quickened slightly at the thought of who would be
piloting the two machines, but he'd tried to remind himself that he
could be just as dangerous to them, that he needed to wait for the
plane to arrive, that trying to do something would only make things
worse.

He'd smelled the gunpowder and smoke all too clearly from his position,
seen as the first explosion blossomed into a cross and sent Eiko
crashing against the buildings around her like discarded rubbish.  He'd
seen the second blast hurl Nieve away, and although she'd been obscured
from view at that point, he'd seen enough of the Angel to know that it
had then made certain she was not getting back up.  Neil doubted that
they were dead, but he had no way of knowing, and from the second that
he'd seen Eiko get blasted he knew that he had to do something.

The Angel was turning now, slowly leaving behind EVA-02, and Neil was
struggling to sort out his emotions as he watched the black beast turn,
its bony face with half-open mouth seeming to laugh at him for his
uselessness.  "I'm just as bad as the Angels, though," he muttered to
himself, his hands slowly clenching and relaxing.  "I could have wound
up hurting Nieve and Eiko.  I'm an Angel in my own right, and I -"

A sudden realization hit him like a splash of cold water, and Neil felt
every muscle in his body tense even as tears began to flood from his
eyes anew.  Guilt sliced through his mind as he realized what he'd
done, realized the sort of coward he'd been, saw starkly the way that
he was behaving as the sun set behind the Angel.  With the last few
fingers of the sun's light extending over the horizon, blocked by the
massive shadow that the Fourteenth Angel threw across the cityscape,
Neil took a brief glance around the land before jumping from his perch
at the top of the airport, letting himself fall and tucking his body in
as he prepared to roll down the steep hill of the airport.

His landing hit hard, but Neil had developed some skill at dealing with
pain if nothing else since he'd begun piloting the Eva, and instead of
wincing he simply let himself roll, the fall helping to augment his
speed as he tumbled down towards ground level roughly.  Clumps of grass
and dirt tore along his clothes, but he barely noticed, simply forcing
his legs into the soft ground and digging his hands in to bring himself
to a stop just shy of ground level.  Pausing for only a moment to get
his bearings, he glanced up towards the airport, realizing as almost an
afterthought that it was much further than he'd originally thought,
then jumped down to the streets of the city, glancing about for an
entrance to Central Dogma.

Eyes settling quickly on the nearest pair of metal doors bearing the
trademark NERV insignia, Neil set off running, ignoring the growing
sense of exhaustion seeping through his body, feet hitting the black
pavement at regular intervals as sweat dripped into his mouth in
regular salty explosions.  The door was his only goal, and as he grew
closer he found himself slowing, finally coming to a halt a few feet
shy of the actual destination.  "My keycard," he muttered, shaking his
head as he drew out the small piece of plastic.  "It's probably not
working any more.  They won't let me in."

Then an explosion tore through the city, shaking the ground underneath
Neil's feet as the world filled with the harsh noise of shattering
concrete and asphalt.  Neil gritted his teeth, then slammed the card
through the reader beside him, hoping against logic that it would
successfully let him in.  The reader flashed no verification, but a
second later the doors creaked open, just sliding far enough apart for
him to wedge himself through.  Smiling even as his tears continued to
flow, Neil hurled himself towards the doors, letting himself slip into
the Geo-Front and head towards the machine that he knew he should be
piloting.

                                  ]++[

Niobe's machine waited patiently beneath the surface of the Geo-Front,
Central Dogma several meters behind her as the Angel blasted away
relentlessly at the armor that shielded NERV's underground sanctuary
from Angel attacks.  It had always been a distant possibility that an
Angel would make it through to the bottom level of NERV, and Niobe
couldn't help but be thankful for that as she further braced the twin
rocket launchers against her sides, mentally refreshing in her mind how
many shots she would get out of the weapons, her breath quickly taking
in and exhaling the LCL, mind completely ignoring the lush scenery
around her.  "I've got to destroy this one," she muttered, training her
launchers towards the spot where chunks of rock were already beginning
to fall from the surface of Tokyo-3 into the Geo-Front.  "I have to be
able to destroy another Angel.  It'll make Ryo love me, I'm sure of it."

The corona of the explosion burst through the stony ceiling, energy
billowing outwards in the shape of an upside-down cross as the Angel
began its descent.  Niobe took one last deep breath within the LCL of
her machine, then waited for the crosshairs on her display to line up
and flash an acknowledging green, the launchers trained perfectly on
the beast in front of her.  "Engaging Fourteenth Angel!" she screamed
over the communicator, her hands slamming the handrests forward even as
the two rocket launchers she wielded roared to life, plumes of flame
jetting outward towards the descending black monstrosity.

Eleven rockets spiraled out from the launchers before Niobe even knew
it, their plumes of flame arcing about as the first pair impacted hard
against the beast's AT Field accompanied by the octagonal ripples that
she knew would come.  Both rocket launchers feel to the ground, then
without hesitation she drew another pair just as quickly from the
ground around her, littered with Eva weaponry deployed at Misato's
command.  She had known she would need more firepower than a single
pair of launchers, and in one fluid motion she had brought the
replacements to bear, pointing directly at the Angel, the display
taking only a moment before it flashed green and allowed her to once
again release a series of rockets towards her target.

Much to her surprise, the Angel seemed unconcerned with even the effort
of dodging, letting the rockets impact against the field steadily while
it slowly descended towards ground level, Niobe's assault continuing
and filling her ears with the sound of roaring flames.  For a moment,
she wondered if the beast would attack her early, her leg muscles
tensing in anticipation of a necessary dodge, but the Angel did
nothing, simply let itself hover down as Niobe discarded the second
pair of launchers and quickly scooped up a third in one quick motion.
"Angel doesn't seem to be counterattacking!" she shouted over the comm,
seeing it move towards her slowly as she tensed and prepared to begin
moving herself.  "I'm taking evasive maneuvers immediately, as a
precautionary measure!"

Something might have come over the radio, but Niobe didn't notice it,
her Eva launching into movement, her eyes remaining focused upon the
Angel and keeping the crosshairs flashing a brilliant green, geysers of
flame erupting from the twin barrels of the rocket launchers.  Her
movements were steady, trained, and as the launchers clicked empty she
quickly leaned down and scooped up another pair, letting herself train
her eyes immediately back upon the Angel.  There was no reaction from
the black goliath except the steady ripples of octagons through the air
and the slow motion in Niobe's direction, both more than acceptable by
her train of thought.  "Makoto, how's the Angel's AT field holding up!
Will I need to close in and finish it manually?"

"Niobe, according to our sensors, you've barely dented the thing!"
Misato's eyes flicked up briefly towards the main screen, watching the
yellow Eva dart in circles around the hovering black Angel before
glancing back towards Makoto's display.  There was a tangible tension
flooding through the control room simply at the presence of the Angel
in the Geo-Front, something that none of the beasts had managed
before.  "It's not being hurt, it's just ignoring you!"

"That's -impossible-!" snapped the girl, forcing her machine to move
faster as she let out a series of brilliant red flares, the rockets
slamming in an explosive barrage against the surface of the Angel's AT
Field, scooping up another pair of launchers as she clicked empty.  Her
feet slammed hard into a lake, the first time she'd even bothered to
notice the scenery, this time more out of the simple fact that she knew
she would be fighting from a disadvantage.  "I've -got- to be hurting
it!  That's not -possible-!"  Grimacing, she launched her machine
forward, the taste of salty blood hard against her tongue as she let
out more shots from the launcher, landing and grabbing another pair as
she trained her shots back towards the beast.  "I'm the best!  I'm
better than -any- of the other pilots!  I can destroy -one- goddamn
Angel on my -own-!"

Before Niobe could even react, the Angel's arms began to unravel into
razor-sharp whips, trailing down to the ground and scraping small
furrows, then lashing upwards towards Niobe before she rolled away.
She needed to get close to the Angel to hurt it, to try and close with
it in order to neutralize the AT Field, but as it lashed the whips
about it seemed to be taunting her, like a cat enjoying the terror of a
mouse.  Forcing her Eva to a stop, Niobe let herself drop the two
rocket launchers that she'd been holding, scooping up another pair and
bracing herself against the ground, her fingers tightening against the
triggers.  "I'm not going to be afraid," she muttered, watching as the
whips tore against the ground of the Geo-Front, her teeth gritting
tightly as her eyes widened.  "I'm the best.  I can do this.  I can do
this -easily-."

Ignoring the sound of warning shouts coming over the radio, Niobe
launcher her machine forward, letting the yellow golem spring towards
the beast, avoiding a quick lash of its whips as she spread her AT
Field as wide as she could.  The Angel lashed towards her again, but
she was already moving again, this time letting the leg muscles of her
Eva launch her into a run, taking advantage of the naturally enhanced
speeds of her machine, letting herself feel as the Angel's AT Field
grew closer and closer.  Her fingers tightened on the triggers as she
watched the octagons start to ripple out, then as they dissolved into
nothingness she slammed her machine's fingers down, letting the rockets
in the launchers arm themselves and begin to slide out towards the
Angel.

Then the whips lashed towards her with blinding speed, and before she
could react the Angel had stabbed both thin metallic strands through
the barrels of the launchers, jamming the missiles in mid-flight and
leaving them primed to explode as the whips drew themselves out.
Niobe's eyes widened as she realized what the beast had done, and she
released the launchers, trying to move away from them before the
inevitable happened.  She was too late, and she couldn't help but
scream as she felt the explosive force of the launchers' entire
payloads tear into her arms, chunks of metal mingling with the burning
heat of the explosion, ripping away armor and flesh alike.

Once the explosion had faded Niobe could feel herself nearly choking on
the bloody LCL, her lower arms aching in a way that she'd never
experienced, her mind tenatively reaching out towards that of her Eva
as she distantly heard the noise of the control room filled with
alarmed shouts.  She could feel nothing of her left arm below the
elbow, and her right arm felt mangled, broken, as though it had begun
to bend in ways that it wasn't supposed to.  Glancing down quickly, she
felt her teeth grit as she saw the ruined bloody stump on her left and
the shattered tan armor on her right, both arms useless as anything but
clubs.  "Niobe," said Misato's voice, sharp in her ear, sounding almost
as disapproving as Joseph's.  "You're too badly damaged.  Withdraw."

"-NO-!" screamed Niobe, a blood rage filling her world as she began to
launch her machine towards the black monstrosity once again, breath
coming quickly, legs thundering across the artificial greenery as the
Angel lashed in anticipation.  "I'll kick it to death!  I'll do
something, I won't -retreat-!"  She screamed, springing towards the
Angel, doing her best to compensate for the lack of balance provided by
her arms, wishing that she'd trained more without them for such a
situation, her right leg preparing to lash out in a kick as she flew
towards the Angel.

Before she had even made it halfway to the beast, it had lashed up
towards her once again, the twin silvery whips stabbing into the joint
between her pelvis and her hips, sending fire along her lower regions
and a scream into the LCL of the cockpit.  The Eva's legs fell to the
ground in an awkward puddle of blood, and the limbless torso slammed
ineffectually into the Angel before falling hard to the ground, Niobe's
entire body on fire with agony as she cried.  "No," she snarled,
watching as the Angel began to turn away and head towards Central
Dogma.  "No!  NO!  NO, NO, NO!  Finish me!  PLEASE!"  Her pain was
fading, and a moment later the visual links was severed as the Eva
became a distant memory.  "Please... don't leave me like this..."

"Severed neural link," announced Maya, the entire command center
seeming almost haunted as Niobe's limbless body twitched once before
falling still.  Maya stared at the main screen for a moment, then back
towards the monitor at her disposal, feeling particularly useless.
"The good news is that the Second Child isn't dead - her vital signs
are a little erratic, but both she and the Fifth are still alive."

"The bad news is that if we don't destroy this thing soon, we're all
going to be destroyed," muttered Misato, her brow furrowed tightly,
trying to force herself to figure out some kind of plan to stop the
Angel.  It had resisted everything they had to throw at it, every
defense and offense, and all that NERV had left was one damaged Eva and
one injured pilot.  Sighing, she tilted her head slightly forward,
knowing that she only had one course of action truly remaining to her.
"Makoto, one my mark -"

"Deploy the First Child in EVA-00," announced Gendou, the sudden noise
of his voice drawing the attention of nearly all within the room
towards the top level of the complex.  Despite the situation, Gendou
seemed to still be perfectly confident about the outcome, his hands
tented in front of his mouth, eyes hidden behind his glasses.  "Arm the
Eva with an N2 mine, for detonation upon contact with the core of the
Fourteenth Angel."  He paused briefly, then adjusted his glasses
slightly, flicking his eyes towards Fuyutsuki for the barest of
moments.  "Maya, contact the medical wing.  Have them prepare Vash for
piloting EVA-01."

"Vash can't pilot that!" shouted Misato, realizing as soon as the words
were out of her mouth that at least part of her apprehension came from
the simple fact that she still felt uncomfortable about the thought of
someone else in the cockpit of the purple Eva.  She knew that it was
entirely the wrong time to be thinking about such things, but as the
sweat dripped down past her lips she couldn't push the thought from her
head.  Besides, she knew that she had better reasons for refusing the
assignment.  "He's in no shape to walk, much less pilot an Eva!  If you
make him get in that thing, he'll die!"

"And what will happen to us if he does not?" replied Gendou, a thin
smile managing to creep across his face, hidden behind his hands as he
flicked his gaze down towards Misato.  "Two Evas remain, and we have
with us two Children capable of piloting them.  I would prefer to
exhaust all of our alternatives before destroying the Geo-Front.  Maya,
launch EVA-00, and contact the medical department."

Misato frowned, glacing quickly towards Maya as the young woman half-
turned her chair to stare at the purple-haired woman.  She knew,
academically, that Gendou was right, that if EVA-00 failed Vash would
be just as dead either way.  It was a simple decision on an academic
level, and as she nodded towards Maya she knew that she was doing the
right thing even though it felt like signing the boy over to a death
sentence.  "Launch EVA-00 on an interception course with the Angel,"
she snapped, trying to fight down the tension rising within her chest,
to forget how close the Angel was getting to Central Dogma and all that
was contained within, to not think about the fact that EVA-01 would be
launched into battle without Neil at the helm.

On the upper level, Gendou nodded as the technicians shouted quick
announcements towards one another for the Eva's launch, the same
procedure that they would have followed under any circumstances, made
commendable by the danger of the situation.  Turning his chair, Gendou
stood and glanced over towards Fuyutsuki, the elder man staring
stoically at the main screen, watching as it switched to show EVA-00
launching into the Geo-Front.  "I will go to oversee the activation of
EVA-01.  The Fourth may need some coercion before he enters the entry
plug."

"This could be the end," replied Kozou flatly, eyes never twitching
from the screen, the display moving back to the slow-moving Angel
retreating from the wreckage of Niobe's Eva.  "But you already know
that, don't you?"  He paused, then let a humorless smile move across
his lips, the red alarm lights in the command center springing to life
from the Angel's proximity.  "You still think we can cheat God."

"I am not cheating God out of anything," replied Gendou, stepping
calmly towards the elevator and letting the doors slide open, the hiss
lost in the sudden blaring of alarms throughout the facility.  "God is
the one that has been cheating.  I simply wish to level the playing
field."  He paused, then stepped inside of the elevator, one hand
reaching out and holding the door open for a moment longer as he turned
back to look at Fuyutsuki.  "This will not be the end.  We have too
much left to achieve."

Below, Neil froze briefly, the sound of the alarm flooding the narrow
teal-gray hallway that he found himself in, a distraction as he tried
to figure out where he had to go to get to the Eva hangar.  He didn't
know exactly where the Angel was, but he was willing to bet that time
was running out, knowing full well that the alarm hadn't sounded the
first time he'd been struggling to navigate NERV's corridors with
Misato.  Taking a deep breath, he fought down the panic within his gut,
turning right down the nearest corridor, feet falling harshly on the
metal floor of the hallway, green eyes flicking about for some
indication of his location.

Sirens were the only noise that penetrated the command room as Ryo's
machine burst to the surface, an awkward stump on its left arm, green
N2 mine cradled within its right arm as its single red eye turned
towards the advancing Angel.  Misato knew that the boy was waiting for
her to give him orders, but it took her a moment to gather the nerve,
knowing full well that the task before him was tantamount to suicide.
"Ryo, advance forward at top speed and bring the N2 canister into
contact with the core of the Angel.  We will detonate the bomb remotely
at that time."

"Understood," replied Ryo, his voice sounding like the same emotionless
tone that he always used, blue machine starting to lurch forward in an
awkward loping run.  It was only afterwards that Misato realized there
had been a note of sorrow beneath his voice, as though the boy knew
full well that he was going on a suicide run before he'd even begun to
surge forward.  Misato bit her lower lip, forcing herself not to say
anything as the blue machine continued forward, flashing red lights of
the center playing across the monitor in what seemed to be a wash of
blood.

Ryo's hands clutched the handles of the cockpit tightly, his breath
coming quickly and shallowly, focused entirely on the task at hand.  He
still hadn't figured out what had happened with Nieve, but he knew now
that he would have no chance of asking her or trying again, that in all
likelihood the black monstrosity in front of him would be the last
thing that he ever saw, the final picture that would fade from his
bright red eyes.  At the same time, however, he knew that he had to
destroy the beast, that he was the only pilot left that had the barest
chance, and he knew that it fell on his shoulders even if he didn't
like it, that it was the one part of routine that had remained stable.
He was the one that had to be sacrificed along with his Eva.

Frustration boiled within Ryo's head, although he could not have put
the name to the emotion as his breaths came more sharply, a grimace
slowly twisting across his face.  Feelings buried under layers of
routine bubbled shallowly to the surface, and as Ryo watched the
scenery around him blur he wondered if he was the one responsible for
breaking the routine, if perhaps it ultimately came down to him.  He'd
been told by Dr. Ikari that he was different than the others, but he'd
never known what that meant, only known that he had to obey procedure,
that steady motions were his universe.

The Eva charged forward, AT Field mingling with that of the Eva,
octagonal ripples disappearing as the Angel lashed upwards with its
metallic whips.  Both stabbed through Ryo's torso, and he winced, but
his focus remained, the last gasp of routine stinging through his mind
as he shifted his grip on the N2 canister.  Giving one last push, Ryo
swung the bomb up and slammed it against the red core of the Angel,
feeling something only for a moment before he watched with mild
disappointment as the Angel snapped a bony cover over its core, like a
bird closing its protective eyelid.

It was too small of a detail for any of those inside the command center
to notice it, and all that they saw was the Angel being hit by the
canister.  "Detonate!" shouted Misato, leaning forward against the rail
of the level, watching intently as the red lights flashed over the
screen and then faded away once more.  The canister exploded outward
into a wall of flame, and Central Dogma rocked, the shock of the
detonation slamming against the pyramid-like structure and sending
Misato falling backwards onto the floor even as she distantly heard the
elevator hissing open.

Apprehension filled the command center, and Misato only spared a quick
glance back towards the elevator to see Ritsuko standing in awe before
she scrambled back to her feet, flicking her eyes back towards the main
screen and hoping against all odds that the Angel had fallen.  A moment
later, the dust and smoke of the explosion cleared, just in time for
the command center to watch the Angel toss aside Ryo, the blue machine
slamming into the ground harshly before the beast continued its
advance.  "Makoto, status of the Angel" she breathed, flicking her eyes
only briefly over to the young man before gaping back at the goliath on
the screen.

"Unharmed," pronounced the technician, his eyes also fixated on the
screen, the fact of the beast's proximity seeming to seep quietly
through the chamber even as the alarms wailed.  "At this rate, the
Angel will reach Central Dogma in five minutes."  He paused, then took
a deep breath and turned back down towards his console, keying in a
quick sequence.  "I'll start setting the Omega protocol.  If the Angel
tries to get past us, it won't survive the attempt."

                                  ]++[

Neil had no way of knowing how bad the situation was getting outside,
but he did know that something was going seriously wrong as he felt
Central Dogma shudder under an assault from outside, sending him
stumbling to the ground.  Cold metal slammed into his side, but with a
slight grunt he forced himself back into a standing position, dashing
through the doors in front of them as they slid open, letting his feet
fall on the catwalk suspended over the empty bay for EVA-00.  The
absence of the blue machine clued him in further to NERV's increasing
desperation - he knew that Ryo had sustained serious damage, that they
wouldn't send out the Eva unless they were grasping at straws - but he
forced the thought out of his mind as he rushed in through the last set
of doors between himself and EVA-01.

Then, exhausted and panicked, Neil stumbled to a stop, the doors to the
hangar sliding shut with a hiss behind him as he fell to his knees.
The purple golem was still there, staring stoically at nothing, its
surface now clean of the blood of EVA-03.  "Always drawing me back," he
muttered, sweat running in rivers down from his forehead into his
shirt, the salty liquid flooding past his lips as he gasped for
breath.  "Niobe was right."  He let his eyes flutter closed, his body
aching and yearning for rest, the Eva watching him dispassionately.

"You are no longer its pilot."  The voice was unexpected, drawing Neil
out of his reverie as he snapped his head up towards the small box that
overlooked the Eva hangar.  Gendou Ikari stood in the window above,
black jacket hanging about his red turtleneck, looking for all the
world like the way that Neil remembered first seeing him.  His face was
disapproving, eyes invisible behind the lenses of his glasses.  "You
chose to no longer pilot the machine.  It is no longer your concern."

"I made a mistake," croaked Neil, slowly drawing himself back to his
feet, fabric shifting uncomfortably around him as he dragged himself to
his full height.  "I ran away.  I was afraid."  Taking a deep breath,
Neil tensed his muscles once again, holding himself rigid, forcing his
breathing to come more regularly.  "I'm here now, though.  I'm not
running away any more."

"How nice for you."  The commander's tone was critical, and Neil felt
his eyes narrowing before he heard the hissing and whirring of an
opening door sounding over the alarm sirens.  Whirling about, Neil saw
a stretcher being wheeled in, a small cluster of technicians
surrounding the white bed, lab coats trailing and fluttering as the
wheeled Vash into the hangar.  It took Neil a moment to recognize the
other boy, plugsuit stripped of any coverings on the arm and the boy's
hair lying limply around his head, but as he stared it became clear to
him what Gendou was planning on doing.

Vash coughed, then forced himself into something resembling a sitting
position, eyes glancing up slowly to see Neil standing in front of him
despite their blurry focus.  Neil could only watch in terror as the
other boy's eyes met his, blue and green eyes exchanging looks, both
Children freezing in place Gendou and the Eva watched.  Silence seemed
to fill the room, and Neil felt guilt surging in his chest anew, the
urge to turn around and run away from the horrific things that he had
done almost unbearable.  Both remained quiet, waiting silently until
the base shook once again.

As the hangar rocked from the impact of what was no doubt the Angel's
attack, Vash began to tumble off the bed, and Neil's reflexes snapped
into action, his body lunging forward and catching the other boy as the
nutrient bath around them sloshed.  Vash winced with pain, but before
Neil could help him back onto the bed he felt the other boy's arm reach
up and grab his shirt collar, yanking his gaze down towards the injured
Child.  "You came back," muttered Vash, voice raspy as blood began to
seep through his bandages.  "Why did you come back?"

"Because I shouldn't have left in the first place," replied Neil, a
single tear managing to pull itself out of the corner of his eye as he
helped Vash back onto the stretcher.  "I'm sorry."  He paused, resting
his hands against the side of the other boy's bed, the sadness and
anger gripping him even as his eyes rested on the Eva for just a
moment.  Then he turned fully towards Gendou, eyes flashing, hands
clenched into fists.

"Send me out!" he shouted, taking a step towards the commander, trying
to read something into the man's blank expression and hidden eyes.
"I'm not going to sit on the sidelines for this.  I am..."  He paused,
head faltering slightly before his neck snapped back up, his jaw set
firmly.  "I am the Third Child!"

Misato stumbled to her feet, still reeling from another assault on the
base, the walls of the command center beginning to visibly crack even
as the red light washed through the room.  "Armor down to 15%!" shouted
Makot, ignoring the sounds of technicians on the lower levels panicking
and running, the command level seeming to be the only level where
everyone wasn't heading for the hills all of a sudden.  "That's been
only three blasts!  We're not going to survive another one!"

Glancing up at the main screen, Misato could see the leering grin of
the Angel stretching before them, the black monstrosity leaning closer
and preparing to tear open the face of Central Dogma.  "Thanks for not
leaving, Makoto," she said calmly, placing her hand on the young man's
shoulder and glancing towards Ritsuko.  She found herself strangely
unconcerned about the Angel's approach, wondering idly where Kaji was
as she managed a smile towards Ritsuko, her eyes flicking back towards
the main screen to see the Angel's eyes flashing with energy.  "Here it
comes!"

A flash of light send the entire wall of the base tumbling inwards, and
Misato could hear screams fill the room as the Angel glared at the
control room, its upper body leaning down and forcing itself into the
control room.  Misato could ee how close the beast was, but she forced
herself not to panic, simply staring at the monster, knowing that she
wouldn't be able to escape another Angel.  In the back of her mind, she
felt something resembling relief at the fact that Neil had left, and as
the Angel's eyes flashed she took a deep breath and closed her eyes,
wondering if it would feel like it had when her father had been
engulfed by the Second Impact.

With a roar of rage and sorrow, Neil sent the Eva crashing through the
side wall of the control room, his vision only focusing on the Angel
long enough to know where it was and slam into it.  A great crashing
noise filled the air as the purple golem collided with the Angel's AT
Field, then a moment later the field dissolved into nothingness and
send Neil's shoulder slamming hard into the black monstrosity, forcing
it to one side and slamming the thing's leering face against the
nearest wall.  The beast struggled to bring its whips to bear, but as
Neil stepped into the massive pit in front of the main control layer he
felt no fear, only anger at the beast in front of him, a burning hatred
at the thought of what it had done to Nieve and Eiko.

"But that was my fault," he muttered to himself, feeling his anger
redouble as he felt the familiar guilt creeping into his mind, his arms
forcing the Angel further back as he crouched and sprang at the beast.
His cockpit beeped a quick warning to let him know that he was down to
four minutes of battery power, but he ignored it, focusing on the Angel
rearing back away from the base, his feet hitting ground as he landed
and tried to shove the Angel further back.  Behind him he could see the
red light flashing, oddly fitting as he drew back the Eva's arm and
slammed it into the Angel, sending the beast floating backwards
slightly out of sheer surprise.

For the first time ever the Geo-Front was shrouded in night, the
overhead lighting damaged by the Angel's entrance and cut from power
when Neil had stepped into the control center, leaving EVA-01 to
struggle with the beast in the darkness, the green decorations on the
beast and the red core of the Angel the only glints of color that
Misato could see.  She was still reeling for a moment, watching as the
Eva drove back the monstrosity, amazed at the machine's quick response
and savage movements.  "Maya, who's piloting the Eva?" she shouted, an
idea forming in her mind, at once terrifying and exciting.

"The Third Child!" Maya shouted back, barely able to contain her
astonishment.  "Synch ratio is up to 67% and rising!  Neural activity
is off the charts!"  She paused for a moment, hammering a few quick
commands into the console at her fingertips.  "The Eva's running off of
internal power, though!  It's only got three minutes left!"

Screaming in rage as the bloody LCL washed over his body, Neil felt
himself losing himself to the cradling rage of the Eva, his anger at
the Angel's treatment of Nieve and Eiko coupling with his anger at
himself.  The Angel was staggering, its whips flailing uselessly as he
continued to drive the beast back, only distantly aware as one of the
flailing metal limbs cut deeply into the thigh of his machine.  Misato
may have shouted something over the radio, but it was lost in the sound
of the Eva's fists slamming hard against the beast's dark hide, sending
it do the ground forcefully.

Neil's eyes only distantly took in the darkened scenery as he sprang on
top of the Angel, dropping his Eva into a crouch and letting the fist
hammer towards the Angel's core.  The impact of the golem's knuckles
sent a small spiderweb of cracks along the glowing red orb, and Neil
felt his lips curl into a smile as he stared at the damaged core, his
arm slamming another blow into the target without hesitation.  He would
have never admitted it before, but he was enjoying the experience of
fighting the beast, the way that it winced underneath his blows, and as
one whip moved up to lash at him he simply reached out with one hand,
grabbing it tightly, savoring the pain as the LCL grew saltier in his
mouth.  "Just a little bit longer," he hissed, slamming the fist down
over and over, feeling his self-loathing grow, his thoughts drifting
back towards the girls involuntarily.  "Come on, damn you, break..."

Abruptly, the visual display snapped off into nothingness, the
connection with the Eva suddenly severed, and Neil knew immediately
what had happened, his eyes going wide.  "No," he gasped, distantly
feeling the Eva lurch backwards and slam into the ground, the sound of
the Angel rising once again more than audible through the armor of the
Eva.  "No.  NO!  NO, NO, -NO-!"

Inside the command center, Misato could only gape at the scene, her
view distant but still clear enough to get a clear sight of the Angel
returning to its vertical stance, leering face turning downward to look
at Neil.  There was a single moment of nothingness, then the Angel
lifted Neil's Eva, the golem's arm still clutching the beast's metallic
whip tightly enough for the Angel to hurl the boy beyond where Misato
could see.  "Makoto, place the display of the main screen on one of the
side walls!" she shouted, turning towards the least-damaged wall as
Makoto nodded and keyed in a quick sequence of commands.

The Angel's eyes flared for only a moment before letting a powerful
blast explode across the chest of the purple machine, sending it flying
backwards into one of the sides of the Geo-Front, fingers sliced off as
the whip tore through the hand that held it tight.  Misato felt herself
grow weak as she realized that the Angel had exposed the Eva's core,
and a surge of panic went through her as the Angel began to lash its
whips against the surface of the core, sending cracks along it.  "Neil
was still synchronized with the Eva when it shut down," she gasped,
taking a step forward.  "Come on, Neil, do something."

"MOVE, DAMN YOU!" screamed Neil, his arms working the handrests
desperately, slamming the mock controls forwards and back, a deep pain
striking him across the chest and sending his body into minor spasms
ever few seconds.  "-WORK-, damn you!  Come on!  You need to destroy
the Angel!"  He was sobbing now, blonde hair drifting through the
bloody sea around him in front of his eyes, his mind recalling his
silent time within the Twelfth Angel.  "Is that what you want?  I pilot
the Eva because -I- -HATE-!  I'm a -monster-!  Just please, do whatever
you have to to make yourself WORK!"

Neil thrust the handrests forward one more time, then he felt something
touching him from the back of his mind, somthing that felt distantly
like the Eva but somehow different.  Then his eyes widened, and he felt
something new shoot through his heart, a sensation too beautiful to put
into words, and within seconds the world had dissolved into light.

A flare of white light flooded out of EVA-01's eyes, and as the control
room gaped the machine's right arm jerked up and grabbed the
approaching metal whip, letting it lash against the hand as if it was
nothing.  The Angel had only a second to react before the Eva pulled
hard, and to the shock of all those within the control room the whip
came tearing free of the Angel, the Eva discarding the strip of metal
carelessly, its eyes turning a brilliant green as it stood once again.
"T-the Eva has reactivated!" shouted Maya, her eyes turning towards her
console and then widening.  "Synch ratio is at 100%!  There's no input
from the cockpit!"

Everyone found themselves riveted to the display as the Eva reached
forward with its damaged hand, the injured flesh bubbling outward for a
moment before new fingers burst free and grabbed the Angel's other
whip, stunning the beast into stasis as the purple golem's jaws tore
themselves open.  A monstrous roar echoed through the Geo-Front, but
Misato's eyes widened as she realized she recognized the voice, that it
wasn't simply a bestial growl.  "That's Neil voice," she gasped, gaping
as the Eva ripped out the other whip and took it in its hand, forcing
the metal into a makeshift spear before leaping at the Angel.  "It's
lower, but that's Neil's voice!"

The Angel fell backwards as Neil slamed into it, saliva dripping from
the metallic jaws of the Eva, the slitted eyes glowing a brilliant
green as the machine slammed its makeshift weapon underneath the
Angel's face.  What had seemed before to be a leering grin now seemed
like a scream of terror as the purple Eva ripped the spear free, then
jammed its hand in the hole it had torn, letting its fingers force
underneath the bony face.  A horrendous ripping noise filled the air,
the Eva tore off the beast's face, blood spurting up and coating the
purple machine, a grin seeming to creep across the Eva's face as it
tossed the face aside.

Seconds passed in relative silence, the Eva simply regarding its
opponent, the light within the red core beginning to flicker out.  Then
the Eva leaned forward, and the gigantic jaws began to tear out the
flesh of the Angel, the gargantuan mouth taking huge bites out of the
fallen beast as the core dimmed to solid black.  Misato could hear Maya
vomiting behind her as the Eva happily devoured the Angel, blood
washing over its purple faceplate, drawing up only briefly every few
seconds as if for breath.

After what seemed like an eternity of its feast, the Eva reared back
anew, then roared loudly, the voice sounding even more like Neil's as
the Eva tilted its head back.  Blood dribbled down from its would-be
lips, then something surged in its back where the power coupling
normally went, the armor around it sloughing off like so much dead
skin.  "It's repairing itself," gasped Ritsuko, and Misato turned to
see the woman staring in what looked to be a mixture of surprise and
joy.  "He's regenerated his S2 organ.  He's recovering on his own."

"What are you talking about?" asked Misato, turning back towards
Ritsuko fully, her eyes only briefly flicking back to the roaring Eva
on the screen.  "Do you mean Neil?"

Ritsuko smiled in a sort of distant fashion, disturbingly similar to
Gendou's smiles.  "You know that the Evas are clones of the first
Angel," she said, her eyes fixed firmly on the beast on the screen.
"But that's not entirely true.  We needed some way of keeping the
original, and we needed to make sure that it was under control... and
we already knew how to bend the First Angel to our will."

"You mean..."  Misato's eyes hesitantly turned towards the screen, the
Eva roaring at nothing, a cold breeze wafting through the shattered
husk of Central Dogma.  She had always discounted Neil's talk of the
Eva having a mind of its own, but as she stared at the beast on the
screen she realized that it was the same beast that had helped kill her
father, the source of the single event in her life that had haunted her
nightmares.  "Neil's inside the First Angel," she gasped, eyes focused
on the blood-stained monster as it finally returned to a standing
position, the implications whirling in her mind as she stared at the
flashing green eyes of her savior and her would-be destroyer.

                                  ]++[

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:
             Far away lies the loved one.
             Far away lies the hated one.
             Far away lies the conflict.
NEON EPOCH EVANGELION 19: MAKING PEACE WITH DISTANCE
"What's lying underneath your words?  What are you -really-?"

                                  ]++[

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