From: eltf@hotmail.com (Eliot Lefebvre) Subject: [Eva][FanFic] Neon Epoch Evangelion: Episode 21 X-Original-Date: 20 Jan 2003 08:46:01 -0800 SEE YOU NEXT 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. I'm a dumbass. This should have been posted last week, but it wasn't, because I'm a dumbass. Only a dumbass could have screwed up like this. What a dumbass I be. Anyways, you get two episodes now, so it's all good. Right? No. ]++[ ]+ ELECTRONIC TRANSCENDENCE PRODUCTIONS +[ presents ]+ NEON EPOCH +[ ]+ E V A N G E L I O N +[ ]+ EPISODE 21: BROKEN HALOS +[ By Eliot "Lostfactor" Lefebvre Based off of "Shin Seiki Evangelion" by GAINAX ]++[ The Lord rewards every man for his righteousness and faithfulness. The Lord delivered you into my hands today, but I would not lay a hand on the Lord's annointed. - 1 SAMUEL 26:23 ]++[ [ 2007 ] The entire world outside was filled with fire, a concept that would have fascinated Niobe far more if she wasn't painfully aware of how distressed her mother was. "Your father should have been home by now," the elder woman said, wringing her hands, glancing anxiously out the window of the house as a resounding shout seemed to shake the building to the bottom layers of its foundations. "He shouldn't be out in this." Niobe, for her part, didn't know what was wrong in being outside at the moment - it looked like everyone was having lots of fun, shouting and jumping and waving candles and torches around. Her mother seemed to think differently, a confusing concept for a girl not quite seven years old. "Where are you, Joseph?" muttered her mother, the words obviously not intended to hit Niobe's ears. It was enough to provoke the young girl to move away from the window, however, walking slowly towards her mother as the elder woman stared into nothingness nervously. Her ebon hair was trailing down behind the back of the chair she sat at, the lines of her face thrown into stark relief by the light shining from the lamp in one corner of the room. "You have a wife and daughter now, you old fool, don't try to be a hero, not today, please..." A shattering noise filled the air, and both mother and daughter whipped their heads around to stare at the window, the world seeming to move in slow motion as the dull-red brick flew through the field of glistening glass shards and impacted hard against the wooden floor. "Jesus Christ," gasped Niobe's mother, grabbing the young girl and yanking her away from the window, pulling her close enough for it to almost hurt. "Niobe, thank God that you came over. Stay near mommy right now, okay?" "Mommy, what's going on?" asked Niobe, beginning to understand why her mother had been so worried, doubting that she wanted to have anything to do with a group of people throwing bricks through windows. "It looks like all those people are having a party or something, but why are they throwing bricks at us?" "Oh, God, Niobe, I wish that you didn't have to deal with this," sighed the woman, slowly rubbing her dauther's head, a sure sign that she didn't intend to answer Niobe's question. "You'll understand more when you're older, but you shouldn't have to understand any of this, not in this day and age." The woman sighed, looking towards the other windows nervously. "Where in the world is your father? For that matter, where in the world are the security guards? Gehirn should be protecting the families of its employees -" The doorknob rattled hard, and Niobe's mother strengthened a grip, now definitively too tight as she stood and pulled herself away from the door. There were no words now, only the sound of shouting from outside growing as the knob rattled more firmly, a dry thump hitting the wood before the handle turned all the way and a dark form staggered into the room. "-Joseph!-" shouted Niobe's mother, placing Niobe down on the ground before rushing over and slamming the door shut behind her husband. Niobe was baffled, utterly confused about what had happened to her father. She knew how strong he was, but there were drops of crimson slowly falling from his body and splattering against the floor, and his entire body was hunched over as though from pain, nothing like the tall and imposing man that Niobe recognized. "Christ, Joseph, where the hell have you -been-? This is the worst that the riots have been in years, and you pick tonight of all nights to be late." "It wasn't a choice," replied the man, slowly drawing himself back to his full height, his clothes visibly dissheveled and torn, a few streaks of blood darkening the fabric. "They assaulted my car when I was on my way home - the first time I was able to get past them, but they overwhelmed me about a block away. Just barely managed to get back before they tried anything more drastic." Niobe stood and stared at her father, utterly confused about how he could be hurt, knowing full well that he was too big and strong for anything to hurt him. His eyes lighted momentarily on the girl as Niobe's mother grabbed a chair, letting the main slump down on something to support him, her hands brushing over his body anxiously. "Oh, God, Joseph, I'm just glad that you're all right," she gasped, tears beginning to form at the corners of her eyes. "Where the hell are the UN forces that are supposed to be protecting us?" "On their way. They're having trouble getting around, though. The rioters have been getting smarter, cutting off access routes and closing them in. It's almost like a war zone out there at times." He sighed, shaking his head limply. "I'm sorry, I should have gotten a special retinue for you. I didn't even think about what the two of you would go through, surrounded by these filthy hooligans. All I could think of was trying to get the rest of the area organized, to try and keep things under control." "Don't worry about it, beloved," replied Niobe's mother, her hands stroking the man's forehead before she drew herself back up to full height. "I'll run upstairs and get some bandages. We'll get you patched up here - I'm not going to risk a trip to the hospital at this point." Letting her fingers linger upon her husband for only a second longer, Niobe's mother headed away, her black hair fluttering behind her as Niobe stared up at her father. His breathing seemed labored, a small blossom of crimson blood welling on his forehead, hands slowly tensing and relaxing. "Daddy?" she asked, taking a hesitant step forward, not entirely certain of what was going on and becoming more frightened by the moment. "What's going on outside? Who hurt you?" Joseph said nothing immediately, simply smiled weakly, his eyes focused on his daughter with an odd look glistening behind them. "I'm sorry, Niobe," he offered, gesturing for her to come closer even as she took hesitant steps. "I wish that you didn't have to grow up in this world, with all these people around you. I wish that you could have grown up in your home as the empress of your land, not a second-class citizen in a land raped by the white men." The man sighed, and Niobe took another step forward, still utterly confused as to what her father was talking about. "Listen, Niobe. I'm going to tell you something very important." Pausing, her father leaned closer to her, one hand closing gently against the side of her head, something tender and at the same moment harsh glistening in the depths of his eyes. "You have to be the best at everything. These white men that rule our world, they think that your skin left you destined for failure, and they'll force you to prove you're worth anything. Unless you're better than them, they'll just try to push you down." He paused, sighing heavily as he stared into his daughter's eyes. "Will you do that for me? Will you promise that to daddy?" Niobe bit her lower lip, her arms falling behind her body as she squeezed her hands together, trying to figure out what was going on. Somebody had hurt her father, she understood that, but she still didn't understand why, nor did she understand all of the people shouting and throwing things outside. It was more stimulation than she'd expected, and she felt - if she could have put such thoughts into words - that she was standing on the cusp of something far beyond her understanding. "I promise, daddy," she replied, taking another step towards her father. "I don't want anybody else to hurt you." A more earnest smile made its way across Joseph's lips, and Niobe felt a warm flood of happiness at the sight of her father returning to normal, a great comfort to her young mind. She knew that she wanted almost nothing more than to make her father happy, that she wanted to somehow make up for whoever had hurt him. Whatever had happened, she knew that it had made him sad, and she didn't want that to happen, not to her father. Not if she could help it. ]++[ [ 2016 ] It was an oddly hazy day outside, the mid-day sun of Tokyo-3 shining through the open window like fire, casting long streaks of light and distorted shadows across the living room. The back of Niobe's mind was reveling in the light, happy to have something to chase away the shadows, even as pain raced up and down her leg and kept her biting down hard on her lower lip. Even the steady heat flooding inward and causing beads of sweat to slowly emerge along her dark skin was worth the light of the sun, the light still better than the bleak darkness of the rest of the apartment. Her leg lay at a painful angle, as though it had chosen to stop just short of twisting itself to the breaking point, the pain still racing up and down from her ankle. Yellow ribbons adorned her calves, laced up meticulously and tied tightly, looking for all the world as though they'd been donned by someone of professional quality. But as she stared at her ankle, letting the agony seep through her skin, she knew that a professional wouldn't have slipped, wouldn't have let herself fail again. Sighing, the girl forced herself to her feet, her legs moving slowly as she balanced gently on the ankle. Her pain abated slightly, but a dull throbbing ache still trickled outwards, and as she tried to tense the muscles to return to her toes the pain redoubled and stabbed through like needles of fire. Gritting her teeth tightly, Niobe tried to force herself, knowing that she couldn't let pain hold her back, hoping that the damage was only skin deep and that the ankle would simply relinquish its protests in a few moments. The ankle refused to support her with a sudden spasm, and Niobe felt herself fall backwards for only a second before the floor hit her back hard. "FUCK!" she shouted, the word shouted simply for the catharsis of saying something, pinpricks of pain blossoming across her back as she drew her leg closer to her and gingerly touched the ankle. Pain greeted a gentle touch, and with a sigh she realized that she'd twisted it, that she'd once again managed to fail at a simple task. "God damn it -all-, I could -do- this," she snarled, closing her eyes tightly for a second before rolling on to her stomach. Joseph still wasn't even answering her phone calls, though Niobe could hardly blame him after the way that she'd acted towards him. Simply thinking about her actions stung something terrible, and she could remember the sound of his voice all too clearly, her hands tensing unconsciously at the thought. As she pushed herself back up to her knees, she felt a wet warmth beginning to flood out behind her eyes, the beginnings of tears forming as she tried to stumble up to her feet. "I failed him," she muttered, a sigh escaping her lips as she tried to relax and avoid crying once again. "I let him down." Her ankle was still protesting loudly at having her weight supported by it, but Niobe ignored the minor spasms of pain as she began to shuffle back towards her room, any hope of actually getting something accomplished now gone from her mind. She simply wanted to change out of the leotard clinging against her skin and fall asleep, to find some way to dull the self-loathing that permeated her world. "But that wouldn't help anything," she muttered, shaking her head as another bolt of pain raced up from her ankle. "I'd still be a failure, still be letting Joseph down. It'd be even worse, because I'd just be feeling sorry for myself." A single tear managed to worm its way free of Niobe's eye, falling and lightly splattering against the floor as she continued along her path, the light of the living room receding behind her as she tried to brush away whatever tears remained in her eyes. She almost couldn't stand to be in the light and the comfort of the sun, feeling as though she hardly deserved it, as though she were ashamed of what she was. Another spasm of pain rocked her ankle, and with a small gasp Niobe fell towards the floor again, the ankle giving out and sending her falling forward this time. Niobe's arms struck the floor hard, holding her just the slightest bit away from the hard wood beneath her, her eyes shut tight as new tears slowly formed in her eyes. "I'm to crawl, then?" she asked of nobody, her upper body slowly lowering down to the floor as her raven-black hair fell down about her. "Even my own body doesn't want me to walk any more. I don't deserve the right to -walk-, much less to be an Eva pilot. Much less to be -anything-." Tears began to fall from the girl's eyes towards the floor, and Niobe let out a small gasping sob as she began to pull herself across the floor, the cold hardness of the wood sliding across the thin fabric and sending a minor shiver through her spine. She wished, in the back of her mind, that Ryo was in the apartment, that the red-eyed boy was beside her when she needed somebody more than anything. A sigh escaped her lips at the thought, her heart grown wistful as she thought of him, the way that he'd looked standing in the moonlight the one night that she'd first truly begun to fall for him. "But I'm nothing to him," she half-moaned, her arms continuing to pull her along as the light receded further, dirt and dust from the floor slowly accumulating along the length of her body, the fabric thin enough for her to feel as each new object adhered itself to her. Still quietly sobbing and hating herself all the more for giving in to sadness, Niobe slowly pushed herself towards her room, wondering what she would do after everything was over, knowing beyond a doubt that she was no longer welcome in her father's home or Ryo's home. ]++[ It was a test like nearly any other that he had grown accustomed to, the LCL washing over his body as he waited in the vertical chamber, eyes doing their best to focus on something even as he knew that the best course of action was to focus on nothing. He'd never had any problem with that routine before, never had failed to be able to clear his mind of thoughts as Gendou had instructed, but for the first time that he could remember he was stuck, other things lingering within his thoughts. As the force of the LCL slowly forced him around and his eyes lighted on Gendou and Ritsuko, he knew that they were aware of that fact, could see their disappointment etched on their faces. But even still, the thoughts lingered in Ryo's mind, thoughts that he knew would have angered the commander immensely had he said anything. He had done his best to follow routine with Niobe, but it had been difficult if not impossible, and more to the point it didn't seem to be achieving the desired effect. Something was wrong, something that he couldn't figure out logically, and he was beginning to find himself wondering if there was truly a point to holding on to the routine. It was a thought that he would have considered insane not so long ago, but he couldn't shake the picture of Niobe fleeing from him after she'd gotten off of the phone, the way that her words had been something more than simply a method of communication. "Ryo." The voice was Gendou's, curt and professional, something beneath his voice letting Ryo know that he was not pleased with the way that the tests had been going. It stirred something within Ryo's chest, knowing that the man was not pleased, a sensation that Ryo had no words for aside from a vague perception of the fact. "We are finished with the testing. You will be returned to your school slightly before noon, after your synchronization testing and other evaluations have been completed for the day." "Understood," Ryo echoed, the vaguest hints of a frown beginning to cross his face as the LCL's currents began to abate, Ryo slowly drifting to the bottom of the vertical tank as the orange-red liquid drained out beneath him. It was a new routine, and he understood that, fully aware that his life was described by routine as he gently coughed up the LCL sitting within his lungs. But he couldn't shake the nagging suspicion that he was doing something wrong by subscribing blindly to routine, a thought that was only reinforced by what he had seen resulting from the routine. Routine had not helped him with Nieve and had done nothing for Niobe, a logical impossibility when Gendou had told him that a logical pattern was all he needed in life. A hissing noise filled the air as the seal around the glass of the tank was removed, and the tube slid upwards, the glass disappearing and allowing Ryo to gently step out of the chamber onto the cold metal floor of the darkened room. Ritsuko, flicking her eyes back and forth between the computer display and the pale naked boy shivering almost imperceptibly, offered him a towel, the white coten accepted gratefully as Ryo began to dry himself off. "Something is wrong with the tests?" he asked, his eyes closed as he went through the simple patterns of drying himself, a routine followed for as long as he could recall. "In a way," replied Gendou, his voice still curt, none of the usual vaguely sympathetic tones that he took with the boy. The commander had been growing more distant with the passage of time, something Ryo hadn't noticed before but was slowly seeing more clearly. Gendou opened his mouth to continue, then paused for a second, flicking his eyes towards the door of the room as it hissed open and Dr. Fuyutsuki stepped in hesitatntly. "Have you been following your routines correctly?" "Yes," replied Ryo, the barest trace of a frown flickering acros his face as he tied the towel around his waist, the cold only slightly alleviated by the act of drying. He paused for a moment, then took a deep breath, unsure of whether or not he would be breaking routine by asking another question. "Is something the matter with Niobe? I have..." He paused, the same frown once again gracing his features for just a moment, as though his facial muscles were trying to emulate something they'd seen others do without being certain of how it was done. "I have noticed some distinct changes in her personality and actions. It is worrisome." "The Sixth Child suffered a great deal of neural feedback during the battle with the Fourteenth Angel," replied Gendou, the answer coming just the slightest bit too quickly, as though he wasn't truly answering the question. "Any abnormalities you notice in her personality is simply a result of her mind attempting to deal with the aftershocks. It is nothing to be worried about." A pause, the man adjusting his glasses, Ryo staring at him and wondering what it was that he wasn't being told. "Is there anything else?" Ryo stared for a moment, knowing that routine dictated he should leave and prepare for other testing, something in the back of his mind questioning whether or not he should actually go on with the routine. Closing his eyes for a second, Ryo forced the nagging question to fall silent, then shook his head at Gendou and turned, walking slowly towards the door. His thoughts were still on Niobe, however, something in him knowing full well that what was going on with the girl had nothing to do with neural feedback. Gendou's eyes watched Ryo from behind his glasses as the blue-haired boy slowly walked out of the room, then snapped his gaze back towards Ritsuko, his expression unchanging but the fact that he was unhappy quite clear from the way that he held his body. "You are certain that there are no malfunctions within the testing devices?" he asked, his voice remaining calm with only the vaguest hints of anger lingering behind it. "Beyond any shadow of a doubt. We extended the test for an excess thirty minutes, they would have shown something if they weren't working right." The woman sighed, letting her fingers move in quick patterns across the keyboard, bringing up the display that she needed even as she knew the commanders wouldn't like the result. "His soul is up to 39% impurity, nearly at the limit for safe operation of the plan. There's contamination beginning to spread inwards from his mind, as well, and the thought processes are breaking down." She paused, almost tempted to let her conclusion draw itself. "I'm not sure if he's suitable as a vessel any longer. There's a great risk of failure." Kozou and Ritsuko both looked towards Gendou, wondering what the man's reaction would be as he stared at the display. They both had some inkling of what he was going to want to do about the situation, but it didn't change the fact that he was looking at years of his own work and effort being dashed to pieces within a few short months, enough to seriously damage anyone's ego. The commander stared for only a moment, however, then calmly looked towards Ritsuko, no visible change in his expression despite the circumstances. "Prepare a secondary, but do not complete the procedure. We will step up the pattern of Ryo's testing. Should he breach the safe barrier, we will be forced to use the alternate." He paused, then turned towards Fuyutsuki, seemingly unaffected by the situation. "What about the girl?" For a moment, Fuyutsuki stared, wondering if the other man would show some sign that made it clear he was truly distressed by the situation, if the loss of so much effort was sinking in or simply didn't matter to the commander. Either way, his expression remained unchanging, and Kozou cleared his throat, still wondering in the back of his mind what Gendou was ultimately planning. "Almost completely integrated," he announced, his voice slightly hesitant. "She should be ready for introduction soon. You've spoken with her, and you seem to be pleased with her progress." "She has Yui's curiosity," replied Gendou, the vaguest hints of a smile playing at the corner of his lips for just a second before he glanced back at Ryo's display. "This is a worrisome development with Ryo, but the benefits that I had hoped to garner by his growth were minor at best, and extended only after the fact. The risk of contamination was unavoidable." Pausing, he glanced back and forth between Kozou and Ritsuko, his eyes almost hidden behind the lenses of his glasses. "You will be able to complete the remainder of the process for today?" "Of course," replied Kozou, nodding as he folded his hands behind his back, a tension growing within the back of his head at Gendou's mention of Yui. His reservations about NERV's ultimate goals had only grown with time, made only worse by the tomb-like air that sat without circulation in the cold and darkened room. "SEELE will probably request another meeting in the near future, and you need to prepare. We will have to begin moving some of our operations at least partially into the light, and that carries a great deal of risk." "There are no alternatives," replied Gendou flatly, turning and walking towards where he knew the door lay, the black of his coat and slacks almost blending into the darkness of the room around him. "We are the shepherds of humanity, tasked with bringing about a new Eden. Toying with risks cannot be a detriment to that fact." Kozou let his gaze linger on the door for a moment after Gendou had stepped out, then shook his head and turned towards Ritsuko, her eyes already trained back on the computer display. "He's not showing any disappointment with Ryo," noted the elder man, stepping closer to Ritsuko and letting his eyes flick down towards the display, scanning along the lines for some useful information. "It's admirable, really. Considering all the time that we've invested into this part of the project." "But like he said, it's not the setback that it could be. -She- could have been contaminated." Pausing, Ritsuko hit a few buttons, shifting the display slightly and beginning the data compilation process, her eyes quickly scanning the screen as the computer worked. "I'm just still curious about where the contamination is originating from. It can't be from school, considering that it continued to spread while he was out of the school. I half-suspect the other Children, but it would be nearly impossible to keep him shut off from all of the others, not to mention the effect it might have of them during operations." Listening to Ritsuko, Kozou couldn't help but notice the way that she spoke of Ryo as though he was an object, and his muscles tensed slightly as he thought of the way that she'd react if she knew the whole story about the boy. "Doesn't that strike you as a little harsh, though?" asked Fuyutsuki, his expression darkening slightly as the computer continued to process the commands it had been fed. "Removing him from almost all human contact?" "Could be a necessary evil in any event," replied Ritsuko, her eyes remaining focused on the computer display in front of her. If she noticed the change in Fuyutsuki's expression, she certainly didn't show it. "But no, I don't think it's particularly harsh. It's simply another stage of the project." "You don't see anything wrong with closing off a boy completely," Kozou said, meaning the sentence as a question but noting that it wound up as more of an accusation than anything. "He's sixteen, Ritsuko, and it's not as though he has a particularly full life anyways. The idea of pulling him out of school and cutting him off from the Children... he'd be living in his own little world, away from everything. That's inhumane." "If we were talking about one of the other children, I'd agree wholeheartedly. I even feel a bit bad about doing it to Ryo. But he's a special case." There was the slightest catch in the woman's voice, as though she were trying less to argue her case and more to convince herself. "Ryo's not a normal boy. He was born for this, and he'll no doubt die for it. Harsh though it might sound, it's the right thing to do." Kozou's mouth half-opened to tell Ritsuko the truth, to spill the one secret that he knew was still being kept from her, something that might have made her change her opinion of Ryo. But he found himself stopping, the words catching in his throat, an embarassing situation for the older man but undeniable. "I suppose you're right," he muttered, the irony of his own lack of personal connections not escaping him as he cast his eyes away from the computer display, letting them rest on Ryo's testing chamber. "Ritsuko... did your mother ever tell you anything about Ryo? Back in the nascent stages of the project?" "She never mentioned him except in passing," replied Ritsuko flatly, the slight catch from before evaporating from her tone. "Any time that she did talk about him, it wasn't a pleasant conversation - she mentioned that Dr. Ikari had something to do with him on a regular basis, but she was never clear on the exact details." She paused. "I suspect she had some interactions with the boy before she killed herself, but I wouldn't know. I stopped seeing her on a regular basis when I turned thirteen." Biting his lip, Kozou cast his eyes towards the blonde woman once again, almost wishing that she'd been present for more of the early days of NERV, that she could have seen everything going on with her own eyes. It was difficult to know that she was being lied to despite how close she was to the highest levels of the command structure, and even though it made him worried for her it was worrisome for him as well. "It's a shame," he said, his voice dropping in volume almost unintentionally. "She would be proud of how you've turned out." ]++[ It was a different school than Ryo remembered, down to the very atmosphere that seemed to permeate the structures about him like a scent. He could recall all too clearly the sound of the other children in the school laughing and enjoying themselves, thoughts of the Angels and the ongoing battle with them only a peripheral concern, a negative possibility that mostly resulted in the need for shuffling into various shelters. But now the yard remained silent, only a few tense laughs breaking the sun-bleached air as Ryo walked slowly towards the terrace, his mind only half-focused on the changes that had been wrought to the school as his legs moved in accustomed patterns. "Niobe is in trouble." The words seemed odd, an aknowledgement of fact that Ryo's logic told him could not be possible. He had been told by Gendou that he didn't need to worry about the problems of the other Children, that the only time they were his concern was inside of the Eva. But he also knew that Gendou had told him that he would not be defended by the other Children, that his role was different, that he would only need to follow routine and everything would be find. "Everything is not fine, though," he muttered. "Something is wrong. Something is -very- wrong." "Ayanami?" The voice was familiar, and Ryo's brain told him that it was the Fourth Child even before his eyes had turned to catch sight of Vash walking towards him, one arm outstretched in a casual wave. Ryo's eyes squinted slightly, wondering if he was perceiving the voice correctly, a bit put off by the boy's appearance. Though it was the right build for Vash, the hair was all wrong, falling down about the other boy's face with the barest traces of black roots visible through the mess of blonde. "I didn't think that you were coming to school any more. You've missed a lot." Blinking, Ryo cocked his head slightly to one side, now certain that it was Vash even though he was still struggling to cope with the boy's new appearance. "Koji," he said, voice remaining flat as he watched the other approach. "I didn't recognize you at first. Your hair looks different." "It's not 'Koji,' it's... oh, never mind." The boy shook his head, stepping past Ryo and waving the blue-haired boy along. Ryo puzzled for a moment, then shrugged to nobody in particular and followed Vash, confused about where he was headed. "Really, though, I'm kind of glad to see you. It'd be nice to have somebody to talk with, even if it is you." Ryo's mouth fell open, and he was about to tell Vash that he had other things to do when he found himself hesitating. The routine he knew dictated that he go straight into the school and arrange his desk, that he prepare for the next lesson and be certain that he was ready. But the routines he knew were beginning to feel awkward, almost hollow, as though he was doing the wrong thing simply by following them. "I'm actually glad to have someone to talk to, as well," replied Ryo, continuing to follow the other boy, the words sounding awkward on his ears. Vash froze momentarily, glancing back towards Ryo in surprise and blinking. "Well, I'll be," he said, shaking his head slightly as he turned towards a nearby bench, taking a few steps before sitting down limply. "I didn't think that you had anything to talk about in the first place." He paused for a moment, sinking his head slightly, then shrugged. "What the heck, go ahead. Tell me what's going on." Staring for a moment longer, Ryo took a hesitant seat next to the other boy, his mind racing with the thought that he was breaching routine so blatantly, the implications staggering to him. He had always assumed that he couldn't break routine okutright, that he didn't have nearly enough control over his life to do so, the very reason why the thought of Nieve being in love had been fascinating to him. Realizing that he was doing it utterly on his own was a heady rush, almost enough to knock him out of his thoughts of Niobe. "I... I'm..." He paused, unsure of exactly what to do. "What was it that you wanted to talk about?" "Ah, never mind, this is much more interesting," replied Vash, a thin smirk crossing his lips as he leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and tilting his head towards Ryo. "I was just kind of wondering..." He paused, then closed his eyes for a second, the barest hints of something deeper flickering across his face like a shadow. "Never mind. Like I said, this is more interesting. Come on, Ryo, spill it." "It... it's Niobe," replied Ryo, wondering if perhaps Vash could provide answers that Gendou and Ritsuko hadn't been willing to. There was some merit to breaking routine for that, he was certain of it, the concept of justification only barely tickling at the back of his mind as he stared at Vash. "She's been acting... odd, ever since the battle with the Fourteenth." He paused. "I think she might be in trouble." Nodding, Vash seemed to be genuinely listening, as though Ryo were just another student in the school. It was an odd sensation, and although Ryo couldn't shake the feeling that his routines were collapsing around him it was somehow liberating to be speaking with the other boy. "How's she been acting?" asked Vash, leaning slightly closer to Ryo. "I mean, is she acting as though she doesn't want to speak to you any more, or like she doesn't want to pilot the Eva any more, or... what?" Ryo stared at Vash for a moment, having difficulty believing that it was the same boy that he had met not so long ago even as he struggled to wrap his mind around what he was doing. "I... I don't know, exactly," he replied, turning his head and letting his eyes focus on the steadily-shifting mosaic pattern of light filtering down through the tree branches. "She hasn't been talking to me as often as she used to, however. And... I don't know, something seems to be wrong." He paused, struggling for the words as a cool breeze filtered through the terrace, stirring the patterns of light on the stone walkway. "I don't know the words. I'm not supposed to be worried about the other Children." Vash sniggered slightly, but by the time that Ryo had flicked his eyes back towards the other boy the laugher was gone, replaced by a somewhat jovial expression. Ryo was utterly confused as to why the other boy was even listening to him, much less seeming concerned about the problem and actually treating Ryo like an equal. "Well, I wouldn't be too worried about Niobe," offered Vash, leaning back in the bench and staring up at the sky, something unusually languid about his movements. "She's a tough girl, after all. Heck, remember when she took down the Eleventh Angel? Ripped that robot apart." "I remember," replied Ryo, a slight frown creasing his features as he found himself thinking of the incident that Vash mentioned, doing his best to remember what had happened afterwards. He distantly could recall that she had been upset then as well, that something had put her into distress, something that she hadn't been willing to talk about. He'd barely noticed at the time, assuaging his curiosity with the knowledge that it was not part of his routine, but as he thought he realized that her unhappiness seemed to have originated from a phone call, a call that he knew in the back of his mind was with her father. "Her parents," he said, jerking his head up slightly. "I think it might have something to do with her parents." "Oh." Vash's words sounded oddly hollow, and Ryo glanced back towards him, catching an odd expression on the other boy's face. There was something there, another item in a long list of things that Ryo couldn't quite explain, but before he could even think to ask about it the expression was gone. "Listen, maybe it's something that Niobe doesn't want to talk about with you right now, but she might be willing to talk to another girl." Ryo blinked, confused slightly by the implications of the statement. "Why would that make any difference?" "Dunno. Girls are like that sometimes. I don't understand it myself." Shrugging, Vash pulled himself to his feet, as though anticipating the gentle ring that announced the time to head back towards class. "But yeah, she might want to talk to another girl, and I know that Eiko's the expert on all things parent-related. I'll talk about it with Eiko, and try to get it so that the two of them have lunch together sometime soon, okay? And whatever I find out, I'll let you know." He paused. "Assuming that you're still going to be in school, I mean." "As far as I know, I'll remain in school for the time being," replied Ryo, standing as well and wishing that he had more adequete words for the sensation he was feeling. It was the same sort of emotion that he'd felt when Neil had spoken with him after their first battle together, an inexplicable sense of being accepted by the other Child, as though he wasn't as different as Gendou kept reminding him. Although Ryo only had the most fundamental perception of it, he knew that he liked it, even if he still couldn't quite figure out what brought it on. "Koji... Vash, thank you." Vash froze for a moment, glancing back at Ryo, obviously surprised at the boy's words, eyes wide until he sighed and shook his head, a thin smirk tracing its way across his lips. "You're something else, Ayanami," the boy said with a slightly bitter chuckle, turning back towards the school's main building and walking with Ryo as few steps behind. "Incidentally, if you don't mind me asking... are you and Niobe..." He paused, then glanced back once again. "Do you like her, or something?" "What do you mean?" asked Ryo, having some inkling of what the question was truly about but deciding to feign innocence regardless. He knew that by the routine he'd managed to piece together he wasn't even capable of being in a relationship with someone, and the memory of his failure with Nieve still lingered in the back of his mind. Despite that, he couldn't dismiss Vash's statement outright, an odd thought bubbling up in the back of his mind. "I believe that she's a fine Eva pilot, and I enjoy working with her during standard operations of -" "Forget I asked," interrupted the other boy, holding up a hand to indicate silence as they drew closer to the main doors. The other students were beginning to crowd slightly, and Ryo could see the almost eerie dearth of live bodies on the schoolyard, the uncommon emptiness around the school's entryway. Vash seemed to notice as well, but he said nothing, simply began to elbow his way towards the entrance, leaving Ryo alone with thoughts that he didn't quite understand. ]++[ Niobe had never been reluctant to sit inside of the entry plug before, but as the swirling red-orange LCL slid into her lungs and choked her momentarily she had the creeping suspicion that something was going to go wrong. Nothing had gone right for her for more than a month, ever since she began to fail at every opportunity, and she doubted that a failure like herself would do well in a round of synchronization testing. "Especially against those two," she muttered to nobody, glancing towards the side of her darkened plug, knowing that Neil and Nieve were sitting in their own plugs not too far away, waiting for the test along with her. "All right, everyone, get ready. We're going to start slowly, so just relax and concentrate on the Eva." Misato's voice was as calm as it ever was, but it did nothing to ease Niobe's nerves as she leaned back against the black cushioning of her seat, her mind struggling to focus as she felt the presence of her Eva tickle at the back of her mind. She had done it thousands of times, and she knew that she was more than capable of making it work for her. It was simply the nagging doubt about herself that kept drawing her back away from the yellow golem's mind, kept her hands relaxing and then tightening around the metal handrests. Outside of the testing booth, Ritsuko found herself equally distracted, her mind lingering on Kozou's words from the day before as Maya slowly called off announcements to her. It was important information, and she knew that she should be listening, but as she tried to focus her blue- gray eyes on the computer display her thoughts kept running away from her and drifting back towards Ryo's testing. Flicking her eyes up quickly, she found herself wishing that it was his time for synch testing, that she had some way of studying the boy, trying to figure out what it was that Fuyutsuki was implying about him. "Dr. Akagi?" The urgency of Maya's voice cut through Ritsuko's mental distractions, and blinking once she managed to force a smile at the younger woman, flicking her eyes back towards the computer display. "Are you all right, ma'am? You look a little pale." "I think I'm coming down with a bit of a cold," Ritsuko lied, knwoing that the truth would only make the situation more complicated than it already was. She could feel Misato staring at her for a moment, both women fully aware that it was a lie, but Ritsuko forced herself to ignore her companion and focus on whatever Maya had interrupted her reverie for. "It's just making me a little scatterbrained, though. What's wrong?" "Nothing's exactly -wrong-, it's just..." Maya hesitated, biting her lower lip for a second before hitting a few quick keys on her observation console and drawing up a detailed graph of the Children's synch ratios. Ritsuko's eyes picked out an abnormality before Maya had even said anything, but the younger woman continued talking before Ritsuko had a chance to say anything. "Niobe's synch rate has fallen. Dramatically. It's lower than any of the other Children's now, even Vash." "40%," muttered Ritsuko, shaking her head as she stared at the graph. It seemed to almost be an epidemic amongst the Children, the dramatic falls in their synchronization since the Fourteenth's attack. It was worrisome to say the least, and not for the first time Ritsuko found herself wishing that there was some way to replace the Children more reliably with computers, wishing that the dummy plug test hadn't been interrupted by the Angels. "Misato, have you told her?" "Must we?" asked Misato, her voice sounding odd, a catch in it that Ritsuko only thought of as a sure sign the other woman would complain about the Children. "She hasn't been coming into Central Dogma like she used to. Before, she would be in here day and night, always pressuring to get more practice time inside of EVA-05, more synch testing, more -something-. Ever since the Fourteenth, though, she's been staying away." Ritsuko smiled thinly despite herself, turning slowly towards Misato as she drew herself up to her full height, her lab coat shifting tangibly against her skin. "I would think that would make you happy," she offered, the slightest bit of nastiness managing to creep into her tone rather intentionally. "I remember how angry you were when I let her out to practice in the first place - you seemed to want her to stop coming around." "Just because I'm happy about the end result doesn't mean I'm confident in the reasoning," replied Misato, arms folded across her chest as she stared into the testing area, her eyes oddly distant as though she was trying to look through the metal of the entry plugs. "It's a sudden shift in the way that she acts, and I doubt that's a good sign. Maybe we shouldn't tell her about her synch rate just yet, considering the situation." "Misato, we're not here to deal with the mental problems of the Children," sighed Ritsuko, once again wishing that she was simply dealing with machinery. It was one of the few things that had once endeared her to Ryo, the smooth and mechanical way that the boy operated, the way that she could predict his responses without difficulty. "We're here to facilitate the usage of the Eva units, and that's it. If you're that worried about Niobe, send her to a pyschiatrist. You might even be able to get money for it out of NERV. But that doesn't change the fact that we're obligated to disclose her synch rate and any changes at the time of -" "I know," replied Misato, her tone curt as she leaned over into the microphone. Ritsuko let out another sigh, this one more gentle as she found her thoughts drifting back towards Ryo, her brow furrowing unconsciously as she let her eyes lose focus. Misato seemed to notice, but said nothing to the other woman, simply flicked on the microphone curtly. "Niobe? Your synch ratio has fallen a bit since last time. Is there something that we should know about?" Niobe's hands tightened aroung the handrests, her eyes going wide in panic for just a second. There was something in Misato's voice that made her suspect that she was doing far worse than the words would imply, and it took a moment of steady breathing before Niobe could even begin to relax herself again, feeling the LCL steadily flow in and out of her lungs as the salty taste exploded across her tongue. "I'm fine," she said, mentally noting that she was turning out to be an even bigger failure than she'd expected. "How low is it? Below fifty?" Silence greeted her for just a second, and the girl's hands tightened again in anticipation, knowing that she wasn't going to like what Misato had to say. "You're currently holding steady at 40%," announced Misato at length, her voice sounding almost apologetic. "That's below standard operating parameters for the Evas." "You're kidding." The words tried their best to sound casual, but Niobe knew that she was starting to panic, feeling her muscles tense across her body as the adrenaline slowly leaked into her system, her hands tightening and relaxing around the handrests as though it was part of a ceremony. "You've -got- to be kidding. I've got one of the highest rates of the Children." "Had," replied Misato, her tone flat as Niobe felt the tension in her body increase. There seemed to be just the slightest bit of contempt riding beneath Misato's words, and Niobe was certain that it was directed towards her, her panic rising as the LCL seemed to thicken around her. "That's why we're wondering if something is wrong. It's a pretty big drop, even with the time gap since your last test... are you sure that you're all right?" A strangled cry of response caught in Niobe's throat, her hands clutching at her head as she violently rocked back and forth. She knew full well what it meant if she couldn't keep her Eva under control, the old threat that she would be kicked out of NERV. The first time that Misato had ever told her that she could be removed, the sound of the words had buried itself in the girl's ears, and she could hear nothing but that as she thrashed helplessly for what felt like an eternity in the bloody liquid, her muscles tensing nearly to the point of breaking. "No," she hissed, trying to focus on the body of the Eva outside of her. "No, no, no, no." There were urgent voices coming over the radio, and Niobe slowly forced herself to calm down as Misato called for some kind of response, her voice growing more urgent with each passing moment. "I'm fine," she lied, crossing her arms and clutching at her upper arms, pulling herself tightly inward. She was anything but fine, but she knew there was no way to say so to Misato, knew that the woman was already disgusted with the failure that she'd become. "It's nothing. I suppose I'll just have to try harder next time." Ritsuko found herself mirroring Misato's frown at the oddly mecahnical sound of Niobe's voice, little doubt in her mind that the girl was trying to cover something up. She momentarily wondered if it might have something to do with Ryo before she felt Misato's eyes on her, flicking her gaze away from the observation room towards her one-time friend. "We're ending the simulation now," announced Misato, almost provoking a reaction from Ritsuko before she realized that the other woman was speaking into the microphone. "Get down to the locker rooms and clean up." "You realize that isn't your call to make," snapped Ritsuko, her voice growing harsher as the other woman flipped the switch to deactivate the microphone. "We're not dealing with the Evas here, and I'm the one who decides when a synch test is and isn't over." She paused, her temper only sharpened by the lingering mystery of Ryo. "Or as you put it, I'll do my job if you don't mind." "I don't care. If you want to keep doing a synch test, fine. But you're going to have to find another set of Children to perform it on." Misato's tone was oddly flat, the only tone that Ritsuko could pick up a vague exhaustion as the purple-haired woman turned and strode out of the room, walking fast enough to nearly slam into the doors before they hissed open. Maya was staring up at Ritsuko, waiting for guidance, seemingly oblivious to the fact that the elder woman was gently rubbing her temple in an effort to calm herself. "Get them out of there," she said after a moment, waving one hand distractedly towards the observation room. "We'll compile a full report from what we've gotten now. It's not worth a fight over." Maya nodded, and with only a moment longer spent looking at Ritsuko the young woman began to type in new commands to the console, leaving Ritsuko to try and ponder out what Kozou had meant even as she tried to figure out what she was feeling towards Misato. ]++[ Niobe wasn't quite sure if she wanted to hit something or cry, thought both seemed like rather attractive courses of action in light of the circumstances. "They can't kick me out of NERV," she muttered, her wet feet slapping against the floor gently as she walked towards her locker, wet hair hanging limply against her back and more than tangible through the thin white cotton towel. She'd never worn a towel before in the showers, had never seen a need to, but she knew that she wasn't half as attractive as she'd always assumed, that her body obviously didn't appeal to Ryo. Even her hair frustrated her, the knowledge that she'd been distracted by her own appearance unwilling to leave her mind as she strode in front of her locker. "They can't kick me out. Joseph wouldn't let them." Her voice trembled slightly with the statement, some uncertainty about the assertion managing to creep into her mind as she unfurled the towel wrapped around her body. The locker room air was cold against her dark skin, painfully so, nopthing that she felt she didn't deserve as she mopped off the few remaining beads of moisture. "I'm their best pilot. They know that. They wouldn't." Her hands were trembling as she reached over to her locker, another frustration to add on to a long list as she angrily pulled the door open. It swung and slammed against the next-door locker with the clanging noise of metal against metal, setting her teeth slightly on edge but alleviating her frustration ever so slightly. "They wouldn't do it," she snapped, gritting her teeth as she snatched her bra out of the locker, taking the barest of moments to examine it. It was lace, another distraction when she could have simply used a plain article, another source of internal scolding as she slid it over her chest and clipped it shut. "Misato wouldn't have the guts to kick me out. I know it." Grabbing her panties from the locker, her trembling grew even worse as she slid the thin fabric over her skin, the sensation smooth, enjoyable under any other circumstances except for the fact that she knew she had no right to feel good about anything. "Won't get kicked out," she snapped, her anger growing despite being directed at nobody. "I'll do better. I won't let them kick me out, not now, not ever. I'll make sure that I do better from now on. I can cut out more distractions, the ones that I should have gotten rid of before." "Niobe?" The voice was Nieve's, an odd tension in the other girl's tone as Niobe whipped her head around. She was standing at the end of the locker row in a short red skirt and a dull orange blouse, her green eyes wide and seeming to pull in the fluorescent light from the fixtures above them. "Do you mind if I come over?" "Do whatever you want," replied Niobe, her trembling not abating as she snatched out her jeans, sitting down and forcing her legs into the rough denim without ceremony. She only distantly heard Nieve's footsteps approaching her, focusing instead on what she needed to do before she could return to her prior synch ratio, to make Ryo notice her instead of Nieve once again. "Was there something you wanted to talk about?" Silence filled the air for the barest of seconds, and Niobe could tell in the back of her mind that she wasn't going to like what the other girl had to say. "Niobe... you're looking thin." The words were fraught with something that the African girl couldn't quite place, something that scared her just the slightest bit even as she tugged her blouse out of the locker. "Really thin. I mean, you've never been really bulky, but you're..." She paused. "Listen, have you been eating lately? Three meals a day?" "I've been avoiding Ryo as best I can," replied Niobe, her tone curt as she tugged the shirt around her body, distantly noticing that the blouse was fitting a bit more loosely than it had before. "It's hard to do, especially since he's been out of school for so long. Now that he's going back, I'll be able to get more to eat." "You can't do that!" snapped Nieve, grabbing Niobe's shoulder and jerking the other girl around. "Niobe, eating isn't about whether or not you want to see someone, it's about keeping yourself healthy. If you don't eat, you could do some serious damage to your body." She paused, hanging her head ever so briefly, giving Niobe just the slightest pause for thought before she continued. "Why wouldn't you want to see Ryo, anyways? I'll admit that he's a little creepy sometimes, but -" Frustration at herself had reached a boiling point within the depths of Niobe's mind, and she found herself lashing out, letting her open palm strike hard against Nieve's cheek. "He is -not- creepy," she snapped, unable to tell whether she was angrier at herself for everything she had done wrong or with Nieve for not wanting the boy when he had clearly shifted his attentions towards her. "You don't know the first thing about him, and you don't know the first thing about me. Don't pretend that you do." Nieve said nothing immediately, and Niobe turned back towards her locker, her hand stinging from the impact with Nieve's pale skin, fluorescent lights feeling physically oppressive as she snatched out her socks and shoes from the locker. "Niobe, this isn't something that you should trivialize," Nieve offered after a moment, her tone not angry so much as concerned, measured and infuriatingly calm. "I know where you're coming from, believe me. Daughters of NERV, remember?" Her hands clenched, and Niobe forced her socks on roughly, slamming her feet into her shoes and wishing that the other girl would simply go away. "Just because we both grew up in this program doesn't mean that we're the same," snapped Niobe, standing and staring at the other girl, becoming aware for the first time just how pale she truly was, her tone only slightly darkened by the time she'd spent in the constant sun of Tokyo-3. "We're from completely different worlds. Now go away. I've got other things to do." "I don't care," snapped Nieve in response, rising to her feet and stepping in front of the other girl, her eyes narrowing slightly as she spread her arms to block off the dark-skinned girl from passage. "Niobe, you need to -eat-. Even if you're busy, even if you're trying to avoid Ryo for whatever reason. Don't you want to eat?" "And what if I don't, Nieve? What then?" Her tone was growing more frantic as she took a step towards the other girl, her teeth locked together tightly. "What are you going to do then, force me to? This is my life, damn it, and you've got nothing to do with it." She snarled, then forced her way past Nieve, knowing in the back of her mind that Nieve was right but utterly unwilling to admit it. "I've got to go meet Eiko for lunch. Where I'll -eat-, thank you very much." The other girl offered no response as Niobe strode out the sliding doors, her hands tensing and relaxing in steady patterns as the fluorescent lights beamed harshly into her eyes. She hadn't wanted to tell Nieve that she just had been trying to look prettier so that Ryo would notice her, especially since the implication that she was looking worse only compouded the situation. She didn't want to have failed again, to have tried to appear attractive and succeeded at nothing, not in the wake of so many other failures. ]++[ She had honestly intended to go to lunch with Eiko, a fact that slightly alleviated her internal anger for lying to Nieve. But there had been no alternative to avoiding the other girl, something that she'd realized halfway to the school, forcing her to run the rest of the way back to her apartment in hopes of making up for the time that she'd lost by going out of her way. It was frivolous, going to lunch with the other girl under the circumstances, forging personal relationships that would only distract her when she was supposed to be eliminating distractions from her life. "Sorry, Nieve," she muttered, stepping slowly into the living room. One hand has holding the scissors, the metal cold against her skin as she stepped into the mid-day wash of light, the sun momentarily blinding before she stepped over to the window and drew the shade down halfway. The room immediately fell darker, feeling slightly more comfortable to the girl as she took a deep breath and sat down on the couch, her chest heaving from the exhaustion of running and the stress of the situation. Her stomach offered a weak growl, hungry before the decision to skip lunch and in no way made happier by the sudden sprinting back to the apartment. "It had to be done, though," she muttered, slowly opening and closing the scissors. "I didn't have any choice. I've got to focus on the important things." She could still remember Joseph's angry words towards her, the things that he'd shouted over the phone, every curse that he'd spat at her about her irresponsibility. She hadn't wanted to believe any of it, but she knew that he was right, that her failure was her own fault, that even though she had thought there were no distractions in her life she had let them crowd around her. "No more personal relationships getting in my way," she said, her hands trembling slightly as she raised the scissors, steel blade glinting against the sunlight. "No more selfishness, no more ignorance, and no more distractions. Just me, my Eva, and Ryo." She took one last breath, then jerked the scissors around and let the blades close with a snap. Distantly aware of the noise of the front door to the apartment opening, Niobe ignored it, focusing on the task at hand, opening the scissor's blades and then shutting them again decisively. They closed with a satisfying clicking noise, enough to give Niobe a mild rush of satisfaction with each motion even as she felt her head growing lighter. "It's the right thing to do," she whispered, moving the scissors again and letting them click shut. "I have to cut out these distractions if I'm going to still be an Eva pilot. I can't let them kick me out of NERV, not if I ever want Ryo to -" "Niobe?" The voice was Ryo's, but there was something odd about it, an odd sort of inflection that seemed not to match his usual flat tone. "Niobe, are you home?" Considering answering for a moment, the girl ignored his voice and let the scissors close with another clicking noise, slowly chanting to herself that she was doing the right thing. "You were supposed to have lunch with Eiko today, but you didn't show up. Is something -" A final snip of the scissors, and the last of Niobe's long hair fell limply to the floor, resting atop the rest of her severed tresses in a pool of sunlight that was drifting in through the window. "Nothing's wrong," she said firmly, staring down at the mass of hair, surprised that she had so much to cut off in the first place. She was certain that she'd been distracted by it more than ever, seeing the volume that she'd had to cut off driving the point home to her. "I just had something else that I needed to do first." Ryo's footsteps echoed through the apartment momentarily as Niobe stood, releasing the scissors and letting them fall against the cushions of the couch as the boy approached the living room. His eyes went wide at the sight of the girl's clipped hair, and Niobe forced herself not to react, certain that he was still testing her, that he simply couldn't admit how he felt after the horrific way that she'd handled herself. "You cut your hair," he said, the surprise evident in his voice. "Why?" The remark stung slightly, but Niobe forced herself to take another deep breath, knowing that Ryo was simply pushing her to show her true colors. "Because it was a distraction," she replied firmly, shaking her head to let a few loose strands of long hair fall free. "In times like these, it's not important to focus on silly things like that. You said it yourself - all that matters is that the Angels are destroyed." "But I didn't mean..." Ryo shook his head, feeling only more confused by the conversation, as though he'd walked in on the middle of a conversation that was already going on. "That's not a reason to cut your hair. Hair is in no way related to destroying the Angels." "Yes, it is," Niobe insisted, feeling her hands tense slightly at the thought that she'd managed to make a mistake once again. She'd already failed to attract Ryo with long hair, it seemed impossible that he'd be equally disgusted with short hair, that he was as unimpressed by her devotion either way. "Without all that to worry about taking care of, I can focus on being a better pilot instead. That way we'll be closer to destroying the rest of the Angel. Eliminating distractions. Right?" "Niobe, cutting your hair won't make you a better Eva pilot," replied Ryo, his words slow and measured, his mind trying to wrap itself around Niobe's train of logic even as he wondered what was really going on. There had to be something more important, he was certain of it, a routine slowly piecing together instinctively in the back of his mind. "And what does it matter? As long as the Angels are destroyed, it could matter less who turns out to be the best pilot." "It -does- matter!" snapped Niobe, taking a step forward as her hands clenched tightly, blue eyes flashing in desperation. "It matters to - you-, doesn't it?" Her breath was coming faster now, her heartbeat speeding up as she stared into the boy's red eyes, watching as her world came down around her. He had to just be testing her, seeing whether or not she would give in and let up in her devotion. That was the only possibility, the only thing that she could logically conceive of. "All I want is to destroy the Angels," replied Ryo, keeping his voice calm even as he noticed the vaguest hint of panic creeping in to his own voice. He was beginning to find half-formed ideas about what was really wrong with the girl floating around in his head, but they confused him, seperated fully from any routine, dangerously unstable despite the steps he'd taken away from his routines. "You know that. I've said as much to you many times." "-Liar!-" snapped Niobe, her hand nearly flying forth and slapping the pale boy across the cheek, her anger and self-loathing compounding as she stared at him and tried to understand why the testing didn't end. She couldn't believe what he was saying, knew that it had to be some kind of test of her ability to remain focused, that she couldn't have failed so dramatically to understand Ryo's words. "You -do- care about who's the best! I -know- it!" Silence passed between the two Children for a moment, Niobe's breaths coming harsh and ragged as Ryo simply stared as calmly as possible, the slightest glints of something other than simple observation managing to surface in the bright red pools of his eyes. Then something imperceptible snap, and Niobe pushed her way past Ryo, moving swiftly as a lone tear glittered in the thin light of the apartment and fell towards the floor. Remaining silent, the girl stepped lightly into the small lowered area for her shoes, letting her feet slip into the sneakers and opening the door in one smooth motion. One glance back towards Ryo, then she was out the door with a slam. Ryo stared at the door for a moment, the expression on Niobe's face etched into his memory even with the sparse seconds of exposure to it. He'd never seen the girl look so hurt before, as though Ryo was the direct cause of her problems even though he wanted to help her. "It's not her parents," he offered to nobody, hearing his words echo against the silence of the apartment, his eyes drifting shut after a moment as he struggled to deal with the tumult his thoughts had been thrown into. Taking a deep breath, Ryo forced himself to move, placing his schoolbag down gently on the floor and stepping into the living room. Something bubbled within his chest as he stared at the limp black hair on the floor, the sunlight glinting off the surface the way that he'd always seen her hair in motion. Biting his lower lip gently, he knelt besides the hair, pushing his hand into the mass and pulling up a small group of strands, watching as each individual piece moved and reflected the light. "When she was dancing," he whispered to himself, trying to sort out the multitude of emotions conflicting within his chest, feelings that he couldn't begin to understand without any frame of reference. "It shone like this then." His hand relaxed and let the hair flutter to the floor a few scant seconds before the Angel alarm ripped through the air like a knife, prompting Ryo to stand and begin to move towards the door as he'd been taught. It was routine, the only thing that he knew for certain, but as his foot rested in the hall directly outside of the living room he hesitated for the first time that he could remember. Glancing back towards the mass of Niobe's discarded hair, he felt himself sigh, struggling to understand what he was feeling and what the girl was going through. Another second passed, and the alarm blared to life again, the steady noise that seemed to be pushing Ryo back into his routine. A quick nod to nobody, and Ryo was moving again, swiftly walking down the hall and into the small space before the door, slipping on his shoes and stepping out, his thoughts lingering on the thin strands still lingering in a pool of sunlight. ]++[ It was the second time that NERV had found a use for the satellite monitoring systems, but as Misato stared at the main screen she couldn't help but wonder how useful they were truly being. All that could be seen of the Angel was a winglike series of glowing projections, like some sort of unnatural bird floating through space, the light seemingly internal and resisting any efforts to make out details of the beast's body. "Just as inscrutable as ever," the woman muttered, arms balancing her just above the drop to the level below. "What's it doing now?" "Nothing, as far as we can tell," replied Makoto, his hands moving slowly across the keyboard, speed dulled simply by the apparent inactivity of the beast. He'd had more than enough time to analyze what was facing them so his task was little more than keeping a watchful eye and making sure that nothing changed. "No energy buildup, no motion, nothing. We haven't been able to gauge the strength of its AT Field, but as it stands it isn't even approaching the surface. It's just waiting for something." "Probably for us," she noted, a frown slowly spreading across her face as she stared at the bird-like form on the main screen. "Either they're getting smarter or more daring. It's letting us take the first move, and betting on us not being able to take it out before it makes its own first move. Either that, or it's just being reckless." She paused, her frown darkening as she flicked her eyes across the screen, as though trying to determine something more about the Angel from the black field it sat atop. "At that height, it's fairly safe against anything we'd want to try on it," offered Ritsuko, standing only scant feet behind Misato, waiting for the other woman to offer some minor acknowledgement of her presence. There was a momentary pause, then Misato turned her head halfway towards Ritsuko, the same resentful expression on her face that Ritsuko recognized from inside the observation booth. "The technical division has been working on the Type-20 Particle Cannon, though. It might be able to at least take a few shots at the beast, though we'd have difficulty setting up the targeting coordinates." Misato stared for a moment longer, then nodded, no change in her expression as she turned back towards the main screen. It stung more than it should have, made in no way easier by the fact that Ritsuko was still puzzling over Kozou's comments about Ryo. "All right, Makoto, start setting up a targeting program to work off of the satellites. Maya, deploy the particle cannon to the surface and prepare the Evas for launch." Sitting inside of the Eva, Niobe could hear none of the conversation, only the harsh sound of her breathing, her lungs slowly ingesting and exhaling the bloody LCL as she tried to force herself to be calm. Her stomach was growling like a caged beast, but she forced it to be quiet, knowing full well that she had other things to worry about, that her top priority had to be piloting the Eva the way that she was supposed to. "No distractions," she hissed, tightening her hands around the metal rests instinctively. "This time I'll destroy the Angel. I've got to. I can't let them kick me out of NERV." The radio crackled to life, and Niobe found herself leaning forward in her seat, her eyes going wide even though there was nothing to see except for the teal-gray walls of her hangar. "The Angel's currently in high orbit, like the Tenth," announced Misato's voice, her tone oddly hollow, as though something was eating at her from within. "Unfortunately, it's too far out for us to hit it with conventional weaponry. We're going to be relying on one of the technical division's experimental weapons, and even then it's a long shot." "Let me do it!" snapped Niobe, knowing that she was speaking too early but not caring. She knew how angry Misato had gotten the last time she'd tried to force herself into an operation, but she could feel the desperation surging within her chest, little doubt in her mind that she was facing the frighteningly real proposition of losing her position as pilot. "I know that you probably have something else in mind, but -" "Actually, Niobe, I was going to send you up anyways. Your machine's onboard targeting system is the best suited to the situation. Eiko, you'll be standing on backup in case something goes wrong." She paused as Niobe's machine began to move towards the launching pad, unable to see the almost sinister smile creeping across Niobe's face. "Be careful. We don't know what the Angel's capable of." "I'll be careful after I've destroyed the Angel," replied Niobe, her voice firm as she jerked back hard on the handrests, forcing herself to focus. She had eliminated all the distractions that she could from her life, and she knew it. There was no way that she would fail this time. Misato sighed gently, then shut off the microphone, letting her eyes flick up towards the main screen as it displayed Niobe's yellow golem streaking towards the surface. "Are you sure that was a good idea?" asked Ritsuko, her tone taking a slightly bitter edge. "You said yourself that you don't think Niobe's doing well. This might be the worst possible thing you could do for her." "Couldn't be worse than your synch test," replied Misato, her voice equally bitter as her eyes continued to rest on the main screen. "Besides, as I see it, Niobe's got more impetus to succeed now. She knows exactly what she has to overcome." She paused, her body shifting uncomfortably from one foot to the other, as though Misato was trying to convince herself. "And she does have the best machine for the operation. We can always pull her out if we need to." Niobe's eyes flicked about her display swiftly, waiting until the second that she saw the street to begin focusing on moving, her Eva stepping off the launch platform as soon as the safety restraints had disengaged. Glancing to her side, she saw the particle cannon, at least half as tall as her Eva, a long and flattened white cannon with an equally large shoulder harness. "The cannon fastens against your Eva's shoulder port," announced Misato, her voice sounding slightly reluctant. "You'll need to jettison one of your flanges." "Understood," Niobe replied, pulling back on the handrest and shrugging her shoulder, the motions helping her to focus as the clamps holding on the tan and yellow flange removed themselves with a loud hiss. Reaching up and removing the thin metal, Niobe placed it gently down on the ground beside her, then reached down and hefted the shoulder cannon, slowly moving the upper half into place. It clamped down fimly upon her shoulder with another hissing noise, the suddenly added weight feeling slightly unbalancing. Forcing the thought out of her head, she swung the rest of the weapon into place, her right hand closing around the handle and trigger while her spare hand helped hold the weapon aloft. The familiar twin red targeting cursors popped up on her screen, and Niobe smiled, watching as her display popped open a quick windowbox showing the Angel's position. "Just like any other operation," she said, tightening her fingers around the trigger and letting the cursors move towards the center slowly, simply waiting for the flash of green to pull and destroy her opponent. "I won't fail. I'll destroy this one, the way that I should have handled the other Angels." "Angel's AT Field is shifting!" shouted Makoto, lunging forward slightly as the sudden activity of the beast snapped him out of the momentary lull. "Pattern is still blue, but fluctuating! We're seeing traces of a green pattern now, the same as the Evas!" He paused, hitting a few more keys. "Energy buildup is detected, but it's not consistent with our data on the S2 organ's energy projections - it doesn't seem to be any kind of physical attack!" Misato said nothing immediately, but her hands reached instinctively towards the microphone, her thumb flipping the switch as the display shifted to the shimmering form of the Angel. It had changed its position slightly, the gigantic wings beginning to scissor closed as an octagonal ripple appeared above what seemed to be its head, as though something had struck it there. Then a flare of light came from the same spot, and though Misato still didn't know exactly what the beast was doing she knew that it couldn't be good. "Niobe! Change your position immediately! Jettison the particle cannon if necessary!" Niobe heard the words clearly, but she ignored them, shoving the handles of her cockpit forward as she tried to pump more power into her AT Field. "No point in moving," she said firmly, watching as her field began to manifest despite the lack of anything striking her, the red targeting cursors growing ever closer to the center of the display. "Whatever it hits me with, EVA-05 can take it, and I've nearly gotten a target lock on it. Just a couple of good shots and it won't matter any more." Distantly aware of the sound of Misato shouting in the background, Niobe focused on moving her cannon in minute degrees, a glint of light showing up on her display as she trained the cannon to immaculate precision, cursors hovering a hair's breadth away from their magical center position. The light in her display grew sharper, but she ignored it and grinned widely as the cursors flashed green, her teeth gritting shut tightly as she tensed her finger. Just before the cannon lashed out with its projectiles, Niobe felt something tickle at the back of her mind, just enough to slow her reactions and keep her from slamming the trigger down quite far enough. Then the tickle became a scrape, then a tear, then a horrific scratching sensation against the back of her gray matter, an agonizing neural mess that speared through her body in surges of electrical agony. "NO!" she screamed, her body spasming as she forced herself to pull down the trigger, vision blurred by the pain, unable to see the cursors drifting away from their locked position. "EVA-05 is firing!" shouted Makoto, his hands still dancing across the keyboard at alarming speeds. "The trajectory is off by at least fifteen degrees! She's firing wildly!" He paused, then hammered down a few more keys, eyes flicking about the computer display behind his thin-rimmed glasses. "There doesn't appear to be any damage to the Angel! Only fifteen shots left inside the cannon!" "Pilot is suffering from severe neural feedback! Something inside that beam is transmitting directly on her mental frequency!" Maya's words managed to sound even more urgent than Makoto's, her hands moving just as quickly as the main screen popped up a few graphs. "There's not much at the moment, but her pain receptors are being triggered at an alarming rate! It's rendering her Eva's targeting systems useless! Synch ratio down to 39% and dropping fast!" "Cut off the neural links!" snapped Ritsuko, her eyes flicking only briefly up to the main screen as the yellow golem writhed within the column of light. "Activate emergency ejection system! Full buffering power to the cockpit, sever all unnecessary systems!" "Unsuccessful!" Maya replied, a thin film of sweat beginning to emerge on her forehead as she frowned at the display. "We've lost all immediate contact with the Eva - it's rejecting external impulses from within!" The younger woman paused momentarily, punching in a different sequence of keys, struggling to make the beast respond to her commands. "Ego and Superego are beginning to form within the Eva! It's reacting to the Angel!" "Niobe!" shouted Misato, staring up at the machine as it thrashed about, arms flailing and sending the particle cannon crashing into buildings around it. There was no response from the radio, only a wall of static as the Eva's head seemed to shift slightly, eyes beginning to flare a bright yellow as its entire body arched back. Within the cockpit, Niobe could feel the scratching sensation still clawing away at her brain, but there was something else accompanying it, a sort of whispering voice just beyond her reach. She couldn't quite make out the words, but she could feel a sort of slime exuding from it, and even without the benefit of hearing it clearly she knew that she wanted nothing to do with it. "Get -away- from me!" she screamed, raising the cannon again, trying to aim it without the benefit of the vanished targeting cursors. "Leave my mind -ALONE-!" Then something stabbed through Niobe's mind like a physical object, and she screamed, clutching at her head as the agony tore through her. Her focus on the Eva was in no way abated, however, and she distantly felt the gigantic machine clutching its head as well, body rocking back and forth as the lines between the two began to blur. "I've got to destroy it," she hissed, her teeth gritted tightly as light shone into her eyes. "Can't let it beat me. I have to be better than this." "But you're not." The voice was clear now if not immediately placable, a sort of odd harmony of voices speaking as one. "You know full well that this is the best you could ever do. Rather pathetic, isn't it? One little insult, and you fall to pieces completely -" "SHUT UP!" screamed Niobe, her hands moving back towards the grip of the particle cannon as she felt her body spasm from the mental agony. Thrusting upwards with the particle cannon, the girl ignored the world around her and let her finger slam down, watching as the glowing white balls of energy hurled forth from the weapon and disappeared into the air. "JUST DIE! DIE DIE DIE DIE!" "Oh, silly Niobe, you can't kill me," hissed the voice, beginning to sound oddly familiar. "You know that you can't kill me. You're not good enough to even come close. A little failure like you? Don't make me laugh, girl." There was a pause, then Niobe felt the scratching beginning at the back of her mind again. "What is there that you don't want to let yourself see, hmm?" "NO!" The girl's shriek pierced the air of the control room, drawing the attention of everyone even as the yellow machine writhed back and forth, still smashing into the buildings around it heedlessly. "Leave me alone! If you're going to kill me, do it, but don't leave me here like this!" "Particle cannon is out of ammunition," announced Makoto, his tone grim as he stared up at the main screen. The Eva had released the cannon's grip, grasping its head once again and leaning back further than seemed physically possible for the yellow golem to do. "None of the shots hit their target." He paused, briefly flicking to another display on his own monitor. "The Angel isn't coming any closer, and it doesn't look like it's having any difficulty maintaining the beam trained on Niobe. Whatever it's doing, it's not going to stop." "Damn it!" snapped Misato, slamming her fist down on Makoto's console out of a need to hit something, not particularly caring if it unnerved the young man. "We've got to have something else here that we can use to hit it, something else with the range to at least see what the beast's AT Field can take!" She paused, thumbing her chin, brow furrowed in thought. Gendou only flicked his eyes briefly down towards the lower level, then trained his gaze back upon the thrashing Eva on the screen, watching as it tore away part of a building in its spasms of agony. "This may be it, Dr. Fuyutsuki," noted Gendou calmly, adjusting his glasses slightly without bothering to look towards the elder man. "We may have found a useful excuse in this Angel." "SEELE won't like that," replied Kozou, a worried frown on his face. He knew that he had other things to deal with, that he needed to focus on the specifics of the operation against the Angel, but his mind was filled with the thought that he had put the girl in the Eva, that it was partially his work that allowed the Angel to place her through such agony. "They'd argue that it wasn't worth the cost. They'll argue that no matter how you decide to use the Lance." "Exactly why this would be the best possible situation to utilize it," replied Gendou flatly, hands tented in front of his mouth, apparently unaffected by the obvious pain on the screen. "We may be able to convince them that we had no alternatives in this situation, to throw further suspicion away from our true purpose. Even if not an optimal situation, it may be the best we'll get." Niobe could see the flames outside of her Eva, hear the screaming noise of the crowd from that horrific night, feel her arms slowly shrinking to the feeble stubs that she could remember from when she was younger. "This isn't happening again," she hissed, forcing herself to maintain her grip on reality, focusing on the harsh metal of the cockpit handles, the flames flickering slightly as she closed her hands tightly enough to send waves of pain upwards. "This isn't the truth. I'm in Tokyo-3, in Japan, I'm sixteen..." "You're right, you are sixteen," mocked the voice, the fire increasing and threatening to engulf her Eva even as he struggled to regain control. "Starting to like boys, aren't you? Going out with your friends, partying, enjoying yourself?" The flames licked against her display, and Niobe could feel a searing heat begin to spread through her legs. "You'd like that, wouldn't you?" "GET OUT OF MY HEAD!" screamed Niobe again, shutting her eyes tightly and thrashing her body back and forth, distantly hearing loud crashes as she looked down to see the legs of her plugsuit on fire. The pain tore through her legs, and she gritted her teeth shut more tightly, releasing the Eva's handrests and trying to slap the fire out, not even bothering to wonder how fire could burn within the LCL. In an instant, the flames vanished, and Niobe felt herself hurtling upwards, away from her cockpit into a sea of LCL ringed by flames and darkness. "What are you trying to do? Give me back my Eva!" Another stabbing sensation tore through the girl's brain, and she spasmed, her arms flailing for something to grab on to before she felt her hand closing tightly around a shaft of glass. Opening her eyes, she saw herself holding a wine glass, standing in the yard of her home as seemingly thousands of people danced drunkenly. "This is what you'd love, isn't it?" taunted the voice as flames began to emerge, Niobe feeling hands begin to grab and paw her. "All the love of other people, enjoyment, relaxing with the crowd. Giving yourself over to the drunken tides of existence." "That's not -true-!" screamed Niobe, lashing out and pushing away the hands grabbing at her, her eyes darting about the yard for the door into her house, only distantly seeing it rimmed by fire. Gritting her teeth, she forced herself through the crowd with swift blows, feeling sweat slicken along her body as she pushed through the masses of human skin. "I don't want to have anything to do with other people! They just distract me from the goal, keep me from achieving anything!" "What about me?" asked the voice again, mockingly, echoing in Niobe's ears as she flung herself through the door to her house. Before she could do anything she felt another warm body fling itself on top of her, sending her falling forward before she kicked off the unidentified body. Snarling, she flicked her eyes back to the assailant, and her eyes widened as she saw Ryo standing again, his skin whiter than she'd ever seen it, only his loose pajama bottoms hanging around his waist. "Don't you want to have something to do with me?" "You're not Ryo!" snapped Niobe, moving swiftly away from the pale- skinned boy as she felt the house growing hotter, flames beginning to sprout around the room. The doors had vanished, leaving only her and the odd apparition of Ryo standing there. "Ryo's different! He's as focused on the goal as I am, trying to do his best! That's why I'm in love with him, because he -helps- me focus!" "Really? You still believe that?" The apparition of Ryo lunged towards her, slamming her against the nearest wall and pressing his pale body against hers, sweat mingling between the two as flames licked about them. "This is what you want from him, isn't it? You want his body, his touch, his contact." The apparition smiled. "You want a relationship." "But that's -different-!" Niobe tried to place her hands on the apparition's chest as the flames began to sear through her plugsuit, but Ryo pinned them against the wall, smiling all the more broadly as the girl's clothes began to burn away. The flames weren't taking her skin, but it made little difference as she felt the heat draw tighter, her arms exposed to the licking flames. "I love him! He pushes me forward!" Her cheek stung as the figure of the boy slapped her hard, pulling himself closer to her as sweat dripped down against her exposed skin. "He holds you back," snarled the other, red eyes growing wider as the face drew closer and closer to her own. "You've grown fixated on him, Niobe Littmore. Too fixated. It's beyond a relationship." The smile on the face grew wider, ice-cold lips touching against Niobe's. "You're obsessed." "Destrado impulse beginning to manifest within the pilot!" shouted Maya, her fingers racing across the keyboard, sweat glistening along her skin as her terror grew. "Synch ratio down to 17% and falling! Niobe's completely out of control! All commands to the Eva unit are failing to connect!" Misato forced herself to take a deep breath, watching the side of the main screen devoted to Niobe's spastic Eva, then flicking her eyes back towards the other half of the screen. Eiko's Eva had propped the sniper rifle against one of the buildings, cradling the weapon as though she'd been using it since the day she was born, the Eva's head moving slightly as Eiko glanced at the sky and then at EVA-05 in steady patterns. "Eiko, have you gotten a target lock yet?" "Not yet," replied the girl, her voice sounding terrified as EVA-04's hands shifted slightly on her weapon, the barrel trembling slightly. Within the cockpit, she could feel every minor motion of the transparent LCL about her, her eyes flicking across her display even as she watched the red targeting cursors draw ever closer to the center. "It's kind of ironic, though, me using the sniper rifle now, after the first operation I ever had." "Irony later. There's an Angel that needs to be destroyed now." Misato's voice was obviously tense, and Eiko couldn't help but sympathize as she felt her eyes drawn back to the flailing yellow machine in front of her. She had no way of defending against the Angel if it decided to attack her, and the knowledge terrified her, especially in light of the damage wrought upon her machine against the Fourteenth Angel. Taking a deep breath, Eiko forced herself to keep her eyes focused on the targeting cursors, her finger twitching slightly against the trigger as she watched Niobe flail about. "It's just like in deathmatch," she hissed, her breath coming more slowly as she watched the cursors move closer to the center, the thought of video games calming her nerves slightly. "Vash takes point, you take backup, just go for the headshot..." Eiko nearly jumped at the quiet sound of the beep of the curors hitting center, but it only lasted for a second before she slammed down on the trigger, letting the blue-white beam of energy lash out towards the heavens, towards the source of Niobe's agony. "Direct hit!" shouted Eiko, her hands clenching around the handrests instinctively. "Is it dead yet!" Makoto's fingers keyed in a quick sequence, and the main screen was replaced by an image of the bird-like Angel, the spindly almost-wings of the beast spreading once again as the beam from the sniper rifle shot towards the beast. It made no effort to move, and the beam slammed into its AT Field harmlessly, the octagons surging outwards and disspating the attack. "Too much energy lost in the passage from the surface," Makoto announced reluctantly. "And that's all the energy that we can muster for the rifle from the power grid - there simply isn't any more available." "God," moaned Misato, slumping forward slightly and resting her head in her hands for just a moment, her entire body seeming to bend for just a moment. Staring at the other woman, Ritsuko couldn't help but feel sympathetic for Misato, knowing the burden that she had to be under. "We've got to get her out of there. We've got to have -something- capable of piercing that thing's AT Field." Inside the Eva, Niobe could feel her reflexes slowing as her vision grew more hazy, her body spasming once out of biological pleasure even as her mind rolled with agony. "Stop it," she hissed, the Eva's movements seeming distant as it thrashed about, the world beginning to fade into an indistinct blur. "You're wrong. I'm not obsessed. I'm not. -I'm- -not-!" "Who are you trying to convince, Niobe?" mocked the voice, coming at her from all angles as her vision blurred to nothingness. "You know your obsession like the back of your hand. You know the nights you've dreamt of his naked body lying against yours, the times you've tried to sneak in a hug or a kiss..." The voice paused, and even though Niobe could see nothing but black she could feel the grin. "The way that you've reacted every time he's spurned you." "He hasn't spurned me!" screamed Niobe, her hands flying to the sides of her head instinctively as her body thrashed back and forth. The physical agony had been bad enough, but it seemed as though the situation was only getting worse, that the torment it seemed to want her to go through was infinitely worse than simple pain. "He's been testing me, making sure that he can rely upon me! He loves me the way that I love him." "Silly girl, don't you realize it?" snapped the voice, a leg clad in the yellow surface of a plugsuit appearing before Niobe's eyes. Looking up, she expected to see her own face, and gaped as she saw Nieve standing before her, hands planted firmly on her hips. "Ryo doesn't love you any more than he loves me. He's not -capable- of loving -anybody-. The only one in love is you, and you're not even in love, just infatuated." The voice paused for a moment, and Nieve began to smile. "Besides, he wouldn't want you even if he was capable of loving somebody. You're -ugly-." "That's not TRUE!" screamed Niobe, lurching to her feet and letting her hands close tightly around Nieve's neck, certain that she was hallucinating, praying to God that she was hurting the Angel in some way. "I'm beautiful! I know that! Everyone always told me that I was a beautiful girl, that -" "Lies," replied the Nieve-thing, her grin beginning to spread too far for her face to have realistically contained it, apparently unaffected by the other girl's tight grip around her neck. "There's nothing attractive about you, Niobe, especially for Ryo. You're too thin, too athletic, and without your hair you look ridiculous." The voice paused, then Nieve's arms reached up and pulled the girl's face closer, the grin continuing to spread to impossible width. "And you're not even the same race as Ryo. You're -black-." Niobe's eyes widened even further, and she released Nieve's neck for just a moment before she let her fists slam into the center of the girl's throat, sending both of them falling to the nonexistent floor with a wet thud. Distantly aware of the apartment slowly fading into view around her, Niobe ignored it, slamming her fists into Nieve's throat, her eyes, her nose, whatever she could reach. "That doesn't have anything to do with it!" she screamed, flailing even as she felt another spike of pain beginning to drive through the back of her mind. "People are people! He loves me!" "I hate you." The quiet noise of Ryo's voice finally stopped Niobe, and she found herself looking down at his face instead of Nieve's, wearing his school uniform instead of a plugsuit, his face battered and bruised. Niobe recoiled in shock, and Ryo pushed her off roughly, slowly drawing himself up to her full height. "I hate you, Niobe. Your appearance disgusts me. You're a failure, and you always have been." There was a pause, then Ryo smiled sinisterly. "Stupid little black girl, think you're better than the rest of us?" Memories of her grade school began to flood back into Niobe's mind, and she staggered backwards, another jab of pain pushing through her body. "No," she hissed, unable to articulate herself any more elegantly, her hands clenching and relaxing in slow rythyms. "This isn't real. This isn't real. I'm not a failure. I'm not a failure." "Of course you are, idiot," offered another voice, and Niobe whirled her head about to see Neil standing nearby, arms folded across his chest. "You're a disgrace. Thinking that you're the best pilot, after everything that -I- did? I destroyed the Fourteenth, the Thirteenth, all the Angels that you couldn't even touch. You're a disgrace compared to me, just a weak little black girl that thinks she's better than she really is." "You can't blame her, though," mocked another voice, this one coming from a clone of Nieve leaning off of Ryo's shoulder, her position implying the obvious. "After all, she's just some weak, scared little girl trying to make it in the outside world. She's got to pretend that she's the best, or nobody's going to notice her, are they?" "Do you hate us for what we are?" asked Eiko, wrapping her arms tightly around Niobe before she even realized that the other girl was there, her head nuzzling hard against Niobe even as her nails dug into the plugsuit. "Because we're not you. This is our world, isn't it? We're the ones who make these buildings, erect these walls, and all you can do is try to be noticed as one of us." "Why bother with her?" mocked Vash, appearing out of thin air and leaning casually against a wall, a contemptuous smile on his face as he stared at the girl. "After all, she's just an imitation. She has nothing of substance to offer anybody. Dancing to our music, using our piloting techniques, trying to be something that anyone can see that she isn't." The boy shoved off from the wall, clenching his fists as his features seemed to go liquid. "Copies are never as good as the original. Don't you think so?" "GET AWAY FROM ME!" screamed Niobe, tearing free of Eiko's grasp and shoving the girl away from her. None of the other Children seemed affected, and as Niobe ran towards the kitchen they simply followed her slowly. Her heart was racing as pain stabbed through her head, feet slipping against the floor of the apartment as she ran towards the door, struggling to free herself from the nightmare around her. Then the door swung open, and she could see herself standing before her, sickly thin, hair a unevenly chopped mess, eyes sunken and bloodshot but wide open. "Mockery," hissed the double, taking a step towards Niobe even as the girl glanced behind her. The Children were slowly shifting to more nightmarish copies, smiles wide across their faces as flames began to lick around the walls of the apartment. "You destroyed yourself and you still weren't good enough. You never even had a chance, did you?" Her lungs swallowed a bloody gasp of smoke, and Niobe stumbled her way into the kitchen, tears streaming down her face as she staggered away from the doubles. Glancing to one side, her eyes went wide as she saw her reflection, saw her form slowly changing to match that of the doubles crowding about her, her eyes receding even as the plugsuit began to hang more loosely about her. "No," she gaped, grasping the handle of the nearest drawer and yanking it open, letting her hand grope around for just a moment before it closed up what she wanted. "No, I'm not a failure! I'm NOT!" A knife glinted in the firelight as the doubles approached, and Niobe brandished it for only a second before moving towards the nearest mockery, the blade down and prepared for stabbing, her motions practiced and smooth. Then the double simply wove aside and slammed the girl down, sending her skidding down on the tile of the floor with a sharp bite of pain through her body. "Worthless," snarled the double, yanking the knife from her hand and stabbing it into Niobe's midsection, provoking a howl of pain. Blood was beginning to bubble up from her lips, a frothy red foam about her lips as she felt her suit going more limp, her body shrinking into a nearly skeletal form. "You're an embarassment," cooed the double, lying atop Niobe and drawing the girl close, a sinister smile across its face. "Never had even the slightest chance of victory, and you knew it. YOU KNEW IT ALL ALONG." "Neural interference has passed all safety barriers! Destrado at fifteenth level and rising! The Eva's mental pathways are attempting a connection with the pilot!" Maya's voice was panicked as she hammered across the keyboard, struggling desperately to try and make the yellow golem respond to some kind of command, to bring it under some sort of control. "No positive response signals coming! Synchronization is holding steady at 10%, but the nerve pulses are beginning to flow backwards!" Gendou Ikari simply stared, the only change to his expression the small wrinkle at the corner of his mouth that might have generously been called a smile. "We posses only one weapon that could possibly pierce the Angel's AT Field from this range," he intoned, his voice oddly sinister as he rose to his feet, eyes never deviating from the main screen. "Instrument of the Second Impact... the Lance of Longinus." "Sir, you can't be serious!" shouted Misato, her panic evident as Ritsuko's eyes widened. It was suddenly clear to her exactly what the commander was planning to do, and as she watched Misato's reaction she truly understood for the first time exactly how little her friend knew. "Using the Lance could trigger the Third Impact! There's too much risk involved!" "Wait!" Neil's voice cut through the air sharply, snapping the entire control room to attention and erasing the mildest traces of a smile from Gendou's mouth. "I just thought of something. The problem with the sniper rifle was the fact that it didn't have enough power to pierce the Angel's AT Field, right? What if we could provide enough power to it?" "That's impossible," snapped Gendou, distantly aware that his tone was too sharp for the situation, that he was letting the barest traces of his true desires show through despite himself. "We've tapped all the available power, and even if we drained all of the power from the Japanese system it would be insufficient. We lack a power source to generate sufficient energy for -" "My Eva." Neil's tone was equally sharp, provoking an almost unnoticable reaction from the commander. "The S2 organ produces effectively unlimited power, right? We could use my Eva as a power generator, to flood enough energy into the rifle for it to break through the Angel's AT Field!" He paused, his tone leaving little doubt that he only liked the plan better than the more risky alternative by a slim margin. "Would it work?" A momentary silence filled the room, and Gendou was distantly aware of Fuyutsuki stepping next to him, the elder man's eyes flicking about the room as though afraid of any listeners. "This might be our only chance to dispose of the lance," offered Kozou, leaning slightly towards Gendou's ear. "SEELE will be suspicious, but if you tell the boy his plan won't work we could dispose of it now." "Unacceptable. They would know that we were attempting to do away with it." Gendou cleared his throat more loudly, then adjusted his glasses and nodded curtly. "Very well. Deploy EVA-01 to the surface, and prepare the sniper rifle for another shot." The commander hesitated, then leaned back and sat in his chair once again, hands tented in front of his face, no visible sign of a break in his confidence. Ritsuko had no way of knowing for certain if she was correct about Gendou's ultimate plan, but she had little doubt that Neil had thrown it off at least slightly, her eyes watching as the purple golem raced up the launch shaft on the main screen. "We're going to need to be creative for this to work," noted Ritsuko, glancing briefly towards Maya, receiving a quick nod. "If Neil injects power directly into the rifle, it probably won't be able to take the stress. The primary power coupling is attached to a subgenerator, though - that could serve as an access port." "Fine," replied Misato, sounding as though she was exhausted, turning towards Maya swiftly and not even bothering to glance at Ritsuko. "Maya, how's Niobe doing?" "Not good," replied Maya, her voice growing less panicked but more grim, hands moving deftly across the keyboard. "Her neural activity has taken a sharp downturn, and the pulse from the Eva has nearly ceased to activate at all. I still can't get the ejection system to work - the Eva's mechanics are shutting down slowly, and life support might be on that list. We'll have one shot at this, nothing more." His hands clenched tightly around the handrests of his Eva, Neil could hear none of the conversation within the control center, could only feel his machine shudded slightly as it raced towards the surface, the rage of the Eva seeming to whisper at the back of his mind. "Can't lose control now," he muttered to himself, forcing the handrests forward as her heard the mechanical noise of the hatch opening above him, machine lurching to a stop as Neil slowly took in the scene around him. EVA-05 had finally ceased its thrashing, now leaning on the particle cannon as though it was a cane, the golem's eyes still shining a brilliant yellow. Eiko hadn't moved an inch, her machine simply waiting for the chance for another shot, eyes looking towards the sky. "All right, how do I hook up with this thing?" "Follow the cord from the sniper rifle. It's hooked up to a generator." Neil nodded even though he knew that the command center couldn't see the gesture, and quickly traced his eyes along the length of the cord, finally letting his gaze rest upon a squat green structure that the power supply was trailing out of. "You're going to have to use the organ to inject power directly into the generator. But it's probably going to be enough to burn the generator out entirely, so you're not going to have a second chance. And..." "You can't tell me how to do it. I guessed that part." Biting his lower lip gently, Neil knelt his machine beside the generator, then took a deep breath and rested his hands upon it gently, trying to extend his mind further back into the Eva's. "Come on," he coaxed, remembering the first time that he'd managed to activate his AT Field, certain that the procedure would be at least similar. "Just do this, and then I'll leave you alone." There was no response from the Eva, only a vague tickling sensation along Neil's arms, and frowning he glanced to one side, watching the body of Niobe's Eva slump against the cannon more and more with each passing second, as though the golem's muscles were giving out. "Come on, don't give out on me now," he snarled, forcing the handrests forward, focusing on the Eva's body as fists tightened. "You've seen the Angels do it plenty of times before now, you can certainly do it yourself just this once..." A brief feeling of sparks came from Neil's arms, and he found himself wondering what the sensation was for just a moment before fire erupted along his arms, the sudden shock of pain sending him lurching back inside of his cockpit. The generator beneath him began to pulse with energy, the Eva's hands glowing a bright white as energy flooded forth, Neil trying to force himself not to panic as pain rippled up and down his arms. "How's that?" he gasped, his fists tightening instinctively from the sheer pain of the effort. "Generator power at 172% of capacity," offered Makoto, his eyes flicking back and forth between the sight of EVA-01's efforts and the display in front of him. "No distinct reaction from the Angel - it's maintaining its position." He paused, then glanced up at EVA-01 once again, hands hesitating over the keyboard. "I didn't know that the S2 organ would let it manifest energy like..." "Like the Angels?" offered Misato, leaning over and flicking on the microphone, only letting her gaze deviate from the main screen for a second to catch a quick nod from the young man. "I didn't, either." She paused, then leaned into the microphone, the main screen's display switching to EVA-04 with the sniper rifle pointed to the heavens. "Eiko, you're going to need a target lock quickly. The generator won't be able to handle that much power for very long." Eiko didn't reply, instead focusing on the cursors on her screen, her hands tight around the handrests, her mind distantly aware of EVA-05 beginning to move again slightly. "I've got to destroy it," she hissed, her eyes narrowing to slits as the cursors hovered an almost imperceptible distance apart. "Just let the targeting boxes line up and pull the trigger." She waited, breathing hard, finger twitching against the trigger of the rifle, her eyes trained closely enough to see the exact second that the target indicator flashed green. Neil remembered the time that he had fired the sniper rifle, but he was certain that the sensation of the weapon's discharge couldn't compare to the massive corona of energy that lashed out from the weapon towards the sky, a blue-white ray that seemed to stretch on forever. It would have been beautiful to observe except for the pain ripping through his arms and beginning to spread through his body, the hissing voice of the Eva still echoing in his ears. "Is it dead yet?" he asked, fists clenching tighter. On the main screen, everyone in the command center could see the spear of light jabbing up from the atmosphere, pushing away clouds from the surface of the Earth as it shot towards the Angel. If the winged beast noticed, it made no effort to dodge, but reacted visible as the beam struck the Angel's AT Field, the octagonal ripples surging outwards from the point of contact even as the beam began to push the field inward ever so slightly. "It's not enough," announced Makoto after a moment, a few quick keypresses bringing up a new display on his monitor. "We're still going to need more power to break through the field - there's a lot of dissipation at this range." Though he couldn't hear the conversation inside the command center, Neil knew that something had to be wrong simply from the fact that he hadn't been told to stop, that Eiko was still training the massive beam of energy towards the sky. "Come on, damn it, die," he hissed, the pain spreading throughout his body as he pushed even harder than he'd dared before, eyes blurring with agony. "Just a little bit more... I know you've got it in you..." Without warning, Neil felt his body pitch forward as he coughed blood, a red mist that soaked through the LCL as his body began to go numb from pain. He was distantly aware of the noise of his Eva's fingers crunching through the generator beneath him as white light flashed out side of him, a dizzy feeling passing through his head at the thought of having just hacked blood into the LCL around him. Coughing again, the taste of blood in his mouth grew stronger, but the pain seemed to be bleeding away, only a distant warmth rippling along his arms. "Please," he hissed, lacking further words as he pushed the handrests as far forward as the metal would allow. EVA-01 applied still more pressure to the generator as its hands cracked through the casing, energy flaring along the length of its arms, pouring into the rifle as the beam it produced grew even wider. The Angel on the main screen seemed to finally grow afraid of the attack as the surge of power rippled along the beam's length, but it was too late to do anything about it as the beam tore through the AT Field, plunging clear through the beast's body. It spasmed once, the beam of light that it had struck Niobe with disappearing into nothingness, then its body darkened and seemed to dissolve, rifle beam still firing off even as it withered away. "Fifteenth Angel destroyed," announced Misato over the radio, her relief more than audible. "Check on EVA-05." Both machines began to move towards the yellow golem, Neil moving slightly more slowly as Eiko helped him to his feet. There was no twitch of movement from the other machine, its body slumped limply against the gleaming white particle cannon, the setting sun casting it into an odd shade. Within the cockpit lay Niobe, here eyes wide and body limp, the only sign of any motion from her the tight grip of her hands around the metal handrests and the half-open position of her mouth. ]++[ Fluorescent lighting bled away the surface of the white hallways, soaking into the white coats of the doctors crowding the chambers, seeming to perfectly the icy stares that hit Ryo as he slowly walked towards his destination. It had been quite some time since he'd been forced to return to the hospital, something that he'd had to do only briefly after the attack of the Fourteenth to ensure that he hadn't suffered any permanent injuries. He could still remember sitting and waiting within his single and lonely room after the devestating activation of EVA-00, though, could still hear the steady and permeating buzz of the fluorescent light, the numb hours marching away into nothingness. At the time, it had meant nothing to him, a simple necessity of the situation, nothing to be worked up about. He couldn't recover that sensation despite his efforts, couldn't help but feel some vague urging away from the hospital room, a thought pattern as perplexing as any of those rattling about in his head. It had never been easy for him to undersatnd emotions, but as he slowly moved through the sterilized corridors into the neurology ward of NERV's internal hospital, he couldn't help but baffle at the things that were emerging slowly in his mind, emotions that he had no names or precedents for, a conflicting series of instructions that threatened the very foundations of his routine. Somehow, it didn't scare him, even though he was beginning to understand the emotion that could only be referred to as fear, the same uneasy break in routine that he had managed to identify from his encounter with Nieve. The death of routine seemed to be the least of his worries, the least frightening of the specters that loomed about his head as he trudged towards his destination, at once dreading and anticipating the encounter he knew that he would undergo. "502." The words felt empty as he stood in front of the sliding door the same soul-numbing white as the rest of the building, numbers carved on a plastic plate to one side. The sensations bleeding through his body were nameless to him, and as he stepped forward he could only let them wash over his thoughts, unable to even attempt to pick out the individual emotions and try to classify them. Beeps filled the room, steady like a metronome, flashing devices wired to Niobe's skin with small white pads. She was dressed in a bland blue blouse and pants, lying limply atop her white sheets, eyes staring towards the ceiling at nothing, her chocolate skin seemingly the only splash of color against the white around her. As Ryo stepped over, he could see that the light had gone out of her eyes, that all that remained was the vaguest hints of the sparkling blue that he'd grown accustomed to and barely even noticed himself expecting. "Niobe," he said, his voice trembling from something that he didn't understand as his red eyes flicked across the girl's body, arms hanging limply at his side. "We destroyed the Fifteenth, Niobe. We did everything that we could to try and destroy it before it hurt you too badly, before it did anything like this to you." He paused, wishing that there was something better to say, the mere concept of desire feeling strangely alien to him. "Obviously, we weren't fast enough." The girl remained silent, and Ryo stared for a moment, briefly considering the routine that he was supposed to undergo before ignoring it. There was a lone chair propped up against a wall, and he stepped lightly over to it, pulling it up to the side of Niobe's bed, sitting in it rather woodenly as he stared down at her. "I was only supposed to come down to see what had happened to you," he explained, fully aware that the girl couldn't hear him. "But I don't think I'm going to leave just yet." Sighing, Ryo tilted his head back, staring at the ceiling along with the girl, his memories casting him back to the activation of his own Eva once again. "They don't know exactly what the Angel did to you," he offered, words quiet, almost drowned by the humming of the fluorescent light. "You suffered from catastrophic levels of neural feedback, enough to kill a fully-grown woman at the height of her health." He paused. "But you didn't die. They don't know if you'll ever snap out of your trance, if you'll ever be able to even speak to another human being again, but you lived through it." A beep issued forth from one of the machines, and Ryo found himself leaning towards Niobe, his hands resting upon his knees. "You were amazing, Niobe. Even without destroying the Angel, you were simply amazing. Anyone else would have died out there, but you... you even stayed synchronized with your Eva the whole time, even after you should have been completely unconscious." His lower lip trembled slightly, the words seeming to catch in his throat. "You never lost sight of the goal, never wavered for so much as a second. You... you just kept trying, certain that you could win if you just tried hard enough." Niobe's chocolate skin seemed inexplicably inviting to Ryo for reasons that he couldn't explain, her hands lying open as if waiting for something to take them. Ryo hesitated for a second, then placed his hand in hers, clasping both hands around hers, feeling the warmth seep from her skin into his, the dark skin contrasting against his own paleness. "I'm sorry, Niobe," he whispered, taking a deep breath, staring at the girl, wanting her to move, to react in some fashion. Thoughts ran through Ryo's head of what had passed between the two of them since they had met, all of their conversations, the times that she had been angry with him and the times that she had wanted to talk with him. Biting his lower lip, he simply stared for a moment before he felt the slightest droplet of moisture splatter against his hand, enough to make him look down, the small traces of water glistening in the fluorescent light. "Am I... crying?" he asked, the sensation flooding through his body unfamiliar and far from pleasant. "Am I crying?" More tears splattered down against Ryo's hand, his vision blurring slightly as he looked up towards the girl's face again, the empty stare that seemed less like the girl he remembered and more like a mask of sadness. "Yes," he whispered, slowly beginning to realize the emotions tumbling about within his chest. "I'm crying. This is... this is sorrow." Choking a sob, Ryo felt what seemed to be a floodgate open within his chest, and a horrific pain that had nothing to do with physical agony tore into him as he squeezed his eyes shut. "I'm sorry, Niobe," he sobbed, tears streaming from his eyes and dampening the bed as he clutched the girl's hand more tightly, his body trembling for reasons that he couldn't understand, breath coming more slowly as he slowly opened his eyes again. "God, Niobe, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm sorry!" Ryo's hands released the girl's hand, and in desperation he embraced her, his arms gripping her tightly as he sobbed against her stomach, the gentle warmth of her body only aggravating the sadness racing through his head. "I didn't mean to hurt you," he gasped, shaking his head as his hands stroked her back. "I didn't want to hurt you, Niobe, I just didn't know. I didn't understand. Oh, God, I was trying to understand, I just couldn't, I wanted to, I didn't want to make this happen!" His sobs grew in intensity, the chair slipping out from beneath him and leaving him leaning over the bed, body broken. "Please, Niobe, say something," he gasped, eyes buried against the girl's skin, his mind recalling every moment that he'd seen her up close, the beautiful curves of her body, the realization of her feelings only compounding his sorrow. "You didn't have to prove yourself to me, to anybody. Not to me of all people. I..." He choked, body shuddering violently as he tried to pull the girl closer. "I'm just a tool. I'm no better than an Eva unit, for never noticing the wonderful girl that I was hurting, for the way that you wanted me, for all the horrible things I... I..." The boy's voice trailed off into sobs, back bent and body defeated as he leaned against Niobe, wailing into the nothingness of the white walls around him, his fingers digging into the girl's back. He could only feel the horrible pain that encompassed his heart, wishing that he had been smarter, that he had never been brought into the world to hurt the girl. She simply lay motionless, unaware of the boy that was crying for the first time in his life against her body, eyes staring sightless into a world filled with her imaginary failures. ]++[ It had, all things considered, been a trying week for Gendou Ikari, but he had long ago taught himself not to be held back by minor details, to push on no matter the tragedy. It was a skill he had learned when he had first lost Yui, something he'd learned well enough to only barely react to losing his son. The atrocity witnessed on Niobe was a tragedy, a fact that more than registered in his mind, but as the holographic monoliths of SEELE appeared around him he forced himself to focus on the task at hand, reminding himsefl that sacrifices occasionally had to be made. "Fifteen seals on the Chamber of Gaf have been broken," intoned the harsh voice of Keel, chairman of the group, the only one whose face Gendou could see without the benefit of any aid. "This was a far more impressive run than the previous Angels, Ikari. Destroyed without the destruction of any Eva units." "A worrisome matter, however, the fate of EVA-05's pilot," offered another one of the monoliths, this with the same universally aged voice of the SEELE constituents. "EVA-07 arrives in Tokyo-3 soon, and we find ourselves short of one useful pilot. Have you at all prepared for this eventuality?" "Unnecessary," replied Gendou, inwardly pleased at the fact that his minor failure of the day had wound up being beneficial, diverting attention away from his own activities. "EVA-05 has a pilot awaiting - the Second will prove to be a suitable replacement, should the need arise for the Eva's deployment again. As for EVA-07..." He hesitated briefly, taking just the slightest moment to let the members mull over what he was going to suggest. "I was going to bring in the Seventh." There was a momentary pause, the barest of murmurs rippling through the darkened air of the room, Gendou managing to surpress the smile that nearly flooded across his lips. "You are treading on dangerous ground, Ikari," spoke Keel at length, voice echoing throught the chamber. "You know full well of our objections to the alleged Seventh Child, especially in light of the circumstances surrounding the designation." "Only two seals remain, and we are in need of pilots. There is little space to be fussy about details at the moment." He paused, pushing his glasses further up his nose, confident that there was little SEELE could do to aggravate this portion of his plan. "More to the point, the Child has been designated and proven acceptable for the task of piloting the Eva unit. We will need all of the pilots to ultimately achieve our goal - without the Sixth, there is a gap in our sequence that can only be repaired in one fashion." "You may utilize the Seventh freely, Ikari," replied one of the hateful old voices hidden by the holographic monolith. "Simply understand that it draws scrutiny towards your actions." There was a pause. "But you tell us that you have nothing to be suspicious of. So there should be no difficulty with a closer look at the workings of your organization, should there?" "And there is none," replied Gendou, knowing full well that the SEELE members were struggling to make him sweat, to make him give in to their pressures and expose himself. He had expected no less, and he took some small pleasure in giving them nothing to cling to or look further into. "I will bring in the Seventh within one week's time, before the arrival of EVA-07. If you have any further questions about the deployment, feel free to ask me at the time." "We have more questions for you -now-," rumbled Keel, obviously aware of what Gendou was doing. The eldest man had always been the smartest of SEELE's members, something that Gendou respected as much as he respected the group's power. "We are aware that during the engagement with the Fifteenth Angel, you discussed using the Lance of Longinus to destroy the Angel." There was a pause. "Would you care to explain yourself?" "There is little to explain," replied Gendou calmly. "The Angel was out of range of all but two of our weapons. One weapon was inaccessible and out of ammunition due to EVA-05's condition, and one was unable to generate sufficient power to pierce the Angel's AT Field. There was only one piece of our arsenal that seemed as though it could satisfy the needs of the situation, until the Third suggested an alternative course of action." He paused. "An alternative only made possible by the fact that his Eva unit possesses an S2 organ." "Ofuscation is not appreciated at the moment," offered another one of SEELE's members, the tone almost amused, the first one of the member voices that Gendou could remember being the slightest bit worried by. It implied to him that SEELE knew more than he thought they did, that he was walking on more tenuous ground than he'd expected, something that nearly provoked a reaction from him. "You had been ready to use the Lance, despite how critical it is to our designs. How would we have retrieved it from orbit after the destruction of the Fifteenth?" "Unless the Angels are destroyed, we stand no hope of ever opening the Chamber of Gaf, Lance or no Lance," replied Gendou firmly, adjusting his glasses once more. "I was in no way enamoured with the thought of utilizing the Lance, but there were no alternatives open when I suggested it." He paused, letting his words sink in. "But EVA-01 provided a viable alternative, leaving the matter irrelevant. The Lance remains within Central Dogma, along with Her body." "Do not attempt to cross us, Ikari," warned Keel's voice, the monoliths surrounding Gendou slowly fading into nothingness. "We have waited too long and placed too much effort into this project to relinquish it without a fight. If you move too far, we will strike you down, have no doubt." Gendou simply stared at the monoliths before him until they faded away to nothingness, letting the darkness slowly encircle the room until their was nothing else remaining besides the pool of light that he sat in. He could still feel a vague tension in the back of his head, brought on in no small part by the amusement of the SEELE members, as though his pretensions of keeping secrets from them was nothing but his own deluded fantasy. Forcing a sigh, he pushed back in his seat and stood, letting his arms hand loosely to his sides and turning towards the door. As he'd grown to expect, the door had already slid open before he was halfway across the room, the silhouette of the familiar girl standing in front of him. "You were unable to dispose of the Lance," she said, her words offering no pretense of being anything but bare facts, light flitting through her thin hair. "Dr. Fuyutsuki has mentioned that we may have no further chances to remove the Lance from the equation, that we may be left with the lance in the equation no matter our efforts." "It certainly appears that way at the moment," replied Gendou, only slightly unnerved by the girl's presence as he stepped towards her. "But we need not worry too greatly about the continued presence of the artifact. Even if it does remain within our possession, our project should be close enough to completion so that we will be prepared to complete it before SEELE has a chance to complete their own goals." The girl simply nodded, waiting for Gendou to step out of the room and past her before following behind him, her eyes focused on him as they stepped towards the elevator. "What of Ryo?" she asked, her voice flat as fluorescent lights traced across their bodies, the lighting thinner due simply to how low in the structure the corridors were. "Well he be departing to take his place soon?" "Ryo has proven unsuitable," replied Gendou flatly, the barest note of regret creeping in to his voice as they walked slowly towards the end of the hallway. "There is too high a risk associated with his soul, too much contamination from his exposure." He paused for an instant, letting himself think on what might have caused the change in the boy, having only the slightest suspicions. "We have prepared an alternative, and he will be deployed for the project instead. It is regrettable, but there are no alternatives." "Of course," she replied, standing a few feet behind Gendou as he pressed the button for the elevator, her body rigid. "You did, however, have to remove the Sixth from the equation. Without her, SEELE may be able to succesfully -" "We will simply have to assure that they cannot complete the sequence," replied Gendou, his voice slightly tense as the elevator doors dinged open. "If we destroy the next two Angels before they are able to prepare their own devices... we may be able to jump ahead of them, to allow humanity's ascension before they can proceed with their own degradation." He paused, glancing only briefly towards the girl's red eyes before hitting the button for the elevator to send them lower in the structure. "It is a difficult burden to bear, certainly. But somebody must save us." ]++[ 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: Strung along for years on end. Strung out and lowered in dignity. Strung across the arms of a cross. NEON EPOCH EVANGELION 22: CRUCIFIX OF HEARTS "If we can't take care of six teenagers, how the hell can we be expected to take care of the entire planet?" ]++[ 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