Misato leaned back in her recliner, blissfully relaxed. Life... was good. No Angels knocking down the city. No moody Gendo to deal with. Her stomach was full, she had a beer in hand... and the muted grumbling from the kitchen told her that she, once again, would not have to worry about dishes. Asuka's voice rose in volume. "I still don't see why I have to do these, you know." She didn't, did she? "Really? Aren't you the one that's always saying how smart she is?" "Wha... what does THAT have to do with anything?" Misato quirked an eyebrow, though the gesture would be lost on Asuka, trapped in front of a sink full of dirty dishes. "Well, Ryoga cooked dinner, so he's off the hook. Besides, given his... problem," and Misato had lost a LOT of sleep over just how that could be handled; after all, it would be damned inconvenient if Ryoga turned into a pig when they needed him, "I'd just as soon not have him in there." "Well? What about Wonder Girl? It's not like she's worried about her hands getting wrinkled, right?" Rei looked up from her seat on the couch, her book momentarily forgotten. She made a noise that could quite possibly be interpreted as an interrogative... if you gave her some credit. "She did them LAST night, or did you forget already?" Upon hearing Misato's answer, Rei returned her attention to the book. Wait a minute... Misato looked more closely. Not a book at all. In fact, that was a comic book. Seconds passed as she tried to come to grips with the fact; failing in that, Misato mentally shrugged. From the sound of clanking dishes, Misato assumed that Asuka had indeed remembered, and had decided to take her annoyance with the chore out on the glassware instead of her roommates. Just as well... nothing SHOULD get broken. Even an angry Asuka was still a perfectionist. The outer door to the apartment opened, and somebody walked in. From the sound of the footsteps... "Tarou, if you're going to come in, shut the door! Were you raised in a barn?" Rei blinked. "Tarou?" "You know anybody else that would let themselves in without knocking?" Misato heard the young man chuckling to himself. "Hovel, actually, and it didn't have air conditioning, but you've got a point." The door gave a hiss as it slid closed, and Tarou walked into the living room. His hair, normally rather loose, was plastered to his scalp, and sweat showed on his arms and stained his pants. He immediately headed for the kitchen. Ryoga stirred; he had slumped at the foot of the couch as soon as dinner was over, curling up against a stray cushion, and had not budged since. Misato's question had been met with a muttered "sleep when you're tired..." and light snoring. Well, he deserved it; Ritsuko had really run him ragged that day, between various tests and training runs. Tarou reappeared, greedily drinking a glass of water. Walking under the ceiling fan, he finished his drink and sprawled out on the carpet, face up. A sigh escaped his lips. "Good day, today, Tarou?" He didn't look at Misato, instead staring up at the ceiling, but his smile was part of his answer. "Found the pervert twice... first time, it was at a health club. I managed to chase him off... caught up with him again, outside of the girls' locker room at Furinkan. Idiot hadn't realized that there wasn't any classes going on." That was worth a chuckle. "So, did you get him?" "Not likely... what, like I'd come back here if he had? I DID tag him one, though. He'll be feeling it for a couple of days." Tarou snorted. "Just a little bit closer, and I'd have had him." Ryoga rolled off of his cushion, wiping the sleep from his eyes. "Hey, Tarou..." "Yeah, pig-boy?" "Go take a shower, man. Your smell woke me up." Tarou rapped a half-hearted knuckle off of the forehead of the other boy, and stood up. "When the pig tells you that it's time to take a bath, well, it's probably time to take a bath." Tarou walked down the hall and disappeared in the bathroom. Misato grinned. Even though Tarou was prone to bluff and posture, and even though he picked on Ryoga incessantly, and even though something had happened between him and Asuka that neither of them were talking about... come to think of it, having Tarou around wasn't exactly all roses, the sweat notwithstanding. Still, though, he DID have a way of spicing up conversation at the dinner table. Wait a second. Misato felt a thought moving through her head, some kind of warning that she was about to make a very important realization, the kind you get just too late to do any good. She blinked once, in an effort to speed up the process and maybe avoid disaster. And there it was... Before she realized that she'd moved, Misato was in the kitchen, shouting at Asuka. Whatever she had said, it wasn't worrying the girl... she stopped to listen. "What? Are you CRAZY? Of course I was using the cold water to wash the dishes." Asuka sniffed, pointedly not looking at Misato. "If that THING destroys the bathroom, then I have to share with it and Ryoga, right? The LAST thing I need is to bathe with perverts." "Oh, okay." Some things were definitely going to take some time to get used to. "Isn't this whole thing a bit silly?" Asuka nodded, turning back to the dishes. "You have NO idea." --- Paradise Lost, part 17 Fan Fiction by Andy Kent All characters copyright Rumiko Takahashi or Gainax, respectively --- Ranma spared a moment to tug at his collar. He'd missed having a mother... he really had. No home-cooked meals. No quiet nagging to reassure him that SOMEBODY still cared. Nobody to tuck him into bed as a little boy... Now, he was learning that there was a definite downside to the situation. Misato wasn't a warm, caring mother. She wasn't a nagging mother. She wasn't somebody that he could tell all of his secrets to, inasmuch as she knew both of the ones that mattered anyway. What she WAS... well, Misato was rather embarrassing. She drank like a fish, flirted with every guy she saw, spent all of her time hanging around Ryoga... and PANTYHOSE, for goodness sakes. She didn't seem to know how to do "mom" things any more than he could get a handle on what "son" things he was supposed to do. And she looked entirely too good for somebody in her late thirties. One thing Ranma was sure about; Mom was NOT supposed to be "cute". He stretched out, seeking calm in a short series of katas. They weren't working, but at least he could look like he was calm. Really, he didn't know why he kept doing this. Come to think of it, why WAS he still putting up with this? He didn't have to have tea with his mother at all. Hell, he could tell her to get out of his life and not come back. She'd even thank him for it, probably. The door to his room opened and Akane came in. He hadn't been facing the door, hadn't turned around. As far as he could tell, he hadn't noticed a distinctive set of footsteps sounding on the floor outside his room. There wasn't any perfume for him to sniff, and quite frankly he would think twice before sniffing any in the first place. Still, though, he had no doubt that it was, indeed, Akane. "Oh... Ranma... you're so lucky!" He turned around, looking at Akane, and his breath caught. Yeah, she really was cute when she smiled. And that was his answer, wasn't it? Yeah. Ranma knew how much she missed her own mother, dead for so many years. For him to reject his own, to her, would seem ungrateful. He tried to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. "Yeah, I know. Can't kill me, right?" Akane's eyebrows quirked, and her smile became more of a wry grin. "Took you long enough to figure it out. Are you ALWAYS going to argue like that? THREE hours?" Oh, yeah, that. He'd been trying to forget about that argument, which had started on the way back from a movie and continued through a (now- destroyed) public park, before ending rather unceremoniously at the bottom of the Tendo koi pond. "Akane... You have this way with words, you know?" She crossed the room, reaching up to straighten his collar, and taking rather a long time with it. Just as he thought to wrap his arms around her, she stepped off, thumping her hand off his chest. "There you go... all neat. Be nice this time, okay?" --- Kaji looked on as Misato turned a pirouette. She looked... stunning. He averted his eyes, trying to avoid too much stimulus. After all, she had places to go, and someone to see. Someone that wouldn't make him jealous, for that matter. Not that Kaji ever was jealous. Ever. Right. "So, how do I look?" Misato stopped in front of Kaji, hands on hips and one knee bent, looking at him. "You're... it's..." He realized that he was fumbling with adjectives, and decided to cut to the chase. "...perfect. WOW." She didn't exactly giggle, but it was much closer to one than her normal laugh. "So I see. You think it'll do?" Kaji slumped against the corridor wall. Somehow, Misato had managed to get permission to go see her kid almost every day, and nobody was worrying about the Angels for once. She seemed to delight in tormenting the poor boy. Of course, if it meant wearing dresses like THAT... "I'm all for it." --- Rei frowned. Well, almost. She'd seen people frown, often enough, and thought she understood the methodology of when and why they did. For some reason, though, her attempts never quite managed to convey the same feeling. If it was the same feeling. Today, for example. She had been reading through these books. Three days ago, Ryoga had told what she assumed was supposed to have been a joke. Unit 02's pilot thought it was funny. Rei had not understood it, though. She had said so. And Ryoga had brought her these the next day. They weren't books, exactly. They used pictures, not just illustrations but the entire surface of the page. The only words were in dialog balloons, along with the occasional sound effect. And, when looked at in sequence, they told a story of sorts. Rei had never been much for fiction... after all, life was stranger, Gendo always said. If she could really learn humor from these, though... So far, her efforts to do so had been a complete failure. As nearly as she could tell, "humor" had much to do with people getting embarrassed, guys scratching the back of their head, and various minor injuries. She filed these points away as perfectly consistent with her observations of the other pilots. Rei vaguely realized that she was wasting her time reading the rest of the books, but as she was in class and ANY activity was a waste of time, that was not a problem. Listening to the lecture would not be productive, of course. She had no interest in the doings or appearance of her other classmates. In fact, in the absence of these books, she probably would have just looked out the window. Not that there was anything interesting out the window... she'd stared at the same landscape for hours, after all... but the sky was blue. For some reason, Rei LIKED blue. Of course, none of this thought was having any effect on Ryoga. He just sat in the desk next to her, watching, as if he expected her to do something. And he wasn't affected by her frown. This was highly inconsistent with his usual behavior... one frown from 02's pilot caused him to become quite uncomfortable, in short order. "Ryoga, I'm frowning at you. Why aren't you noticing?" "Why aren't I..." The portion of Ryoga's forehead that was visible over his bandanas wrinkled in thought. "You were FROWNING?" Another inconsistent statement. Ryoga was perfectly capable of recognizing facial expressions. "Yes." "Rei..." He chuckled, and scratched the back of his head. Two signals that he found the situation funny. She filed it away for later study. "You know, I couldn't tell you were frowning. Your face didn't change." She frowned again. "Yes, it did." "No, that's not a frown. That looks almost exactly like you ALWAYS look. Here." Ryoga squinted his eyes, drawing his face up into an incredibly exaggerated expression. His voice was slightly distorted as he said, "Can you dho THIS?" She tried. It must be an example of a "comical expression", although what that had to do with frowning remained a mystery. She tensed muscles over her eyes, and at the corners. At the same time, she tried to draw the skin of her jaw down, lower than her mouth line. Her neck nearly spasmed from the unaccustomed strain. "Like this?" "PERFECT. Rei, you're frowning." Ryoga gave himself a self-satisfied nod. "Ryoga, this hurts." Rei dropped the expression. He nodded. "Well, yeah. Don't use it too often." Rei turned her attention back to the stack of books. She obviously had no further need for the one she had just finished, so she selected one from the middle of the pile. There was no point in sticking to the established order, as she did not believe that Ryoga had any skill along those lines. She read the title... "Futuba-kun no Change." Five minutes later, she smiled. THIS kind of humor she could appreciate. --- Ranma eased himself into the seat. They'd both managed to get to the coffee shop without incident, and maybe the public location would restrain some of her wilder impulses... well, maybe it wouldn't. He told himself to calm down. Akane had TOLD him to be nice, and for once he felt like actually DOING something that he'd been told to do. His mother wasn't helping things. Her dress... it wasn't revealing, it wasn't low- or high-cut or anything... it was a simple red dress. Somehow, though, she WORE it in a way that had left tongues hanging out all over the city. The waiter, taking their orders, had nearly blotted out the ink on his pad with drool. Ranma had had to frown and grunt to get the guy to go away. Nice thoughts. Happy thoughts. CALM thoughts. "So, how's it going, Mom?" Misato leaned back, relaxing in her side of the booth. "Not bad, all things considered. You?" That... was a very good question. "Really good, I think. I mean... nobody's trying to kill me right now. I'm getting married. I haven't been in a good fight in weeks." Her eyebrows shot up. "That fight against Ryoga wasn't a good fight?" "Heck no. We were just playing around. In a REAL fight, I would have pasted him." He laughed. "If it wasn't for the city being attacked every so often, I'd call this boring. Not that it's my problem..." Too late, his common sense kicked in. It WAS, in a very real way, Misato's problem, and making fun of it would just get her started. She didn't rise to the bait. "It's a bit tiring, really. I never had any idea that it was so much work to keep track of four kids." Four? Ranma mentally counted off. Ryoga, Rei, Asuka... Oh yeah. Tarou. Not that he was young enough to be called a kid, really. Ranma could understand why she had to take care of Ryoga, the poor guy would get lost in a room with one door, and he couldn't care less where Rei or Asuka stayed, but... "Why do you hang around with that Pantyhose creep, anyway? He's not bugging you, is he?" "Creep?" Misato shook her head. "He's got an opinion of himself, yeah, but he's been a perfect gentleman." "RIGHT. He's a fruit! I mean, just LOOK at him!" Ranma waved a hand across the table. "Bah. I don't care. Do what you like with him." "You know, you two could probably take out Happosai if you worked together... Ryoga's told me a bit about him. Perverted, isn't he?" Ranma grimaced. "And how. Um... we've tried that before, sorta. The old guy, he's slippery, it didn't work quite that way. Damn, but I wish that Pantyhose would find and get rid of the lech." Misato smiled. "Kind of a drag, having a master that's such a pervert, huh?" "Well, yeah..." That wasn't a smile on Misato's face. More of a leer. "Though, I bet he taught you ALL sorts of nice tricks. FOUR fiancées? Really?" A ball of ice formed in the pit of Ranma's stomach. "Uh..." Her voice lowered, just short of a whisper. "So... how many of them have you scored with?" Ranma's thought process stopped, in shock, for all of three seconds. He felt his cheeks flaming. "NONE," he hissed, in as harsh a whisper as he could manage, "thank you very much! That's not any..." "...of my business? SURE it is. You're telling me that you didn't sleep with ANY of them?" She threw him a quizzical look. "You're straight, right?" "Yes, I'm straight." Well, might as well get it out in the open... "It's not like that, you know." "Oh, come on. Akane's great-looking. That okonomiyaki chef, she's pretty cute too, right? And that one that broke in? I got a look at her; you can't BUY..." he wasn't listening anymore, right? No, not at all... la la la... la la la... was she done yet? "...out to THERE! And you never once thought of..." He had been blushing before, but THIS... he was surprised that his face didn't catch fire and burn off. Which may have been better, now that he thought of it. "Yes, all right? Hell yes, I thought about it. Who wouldn't have? But it's not like I could have just boffed any of them and that was it. I'm not that kind of guy!" Well, really, he wasn't. Of course, it helped that Shampoo was attached to Cologne, the greatest sexual turn-off that man had ever known. Akane probably would have hammered him through the moon, if he even ASKED about that. She'd probably STILL do that, and they were engaged for real now. Kodachi... Ranma shuddered at the thought of what SHE might have liked to do in bed. And Ukyou... well, she surely wouldn't have been violent about it. Heck, he was surprised she hadn't ever tried asking him. And more than a little relieved, too. After all, she WAS cute. And she did... had loved him. It was just... just... She wasn't Akane. Damn. Monogamy was going to suit him. Who'd have figured? He looked up, saw the expression in Misato's eyes, and decided not to press the issue. "You get the point?" "Okay, okay! I get it already." The nosy waiter glided in from over Ranma's shoulder. "Your iced tea is ready." With great ceremony, he placed a glass from his tray in front of Misato. Misato looked up at him in surprise. "Iced? We didn't order iced..." "My apologies, but we're having some technical problems and the kitchen's power isn't ru... uh... uhhhh..." The waiter, bowing over the table, nearly fainted as his eyes followed the neckline of Misato's dress. Ranma shot out an arm, intent on teaching the pervert a lesson in not hitting on people's mothers... at the same instant that the man lost his balance. A cold shock, a familiar wrenching sensation, and Ranma grit her teeth in disgust. This was the last thing she'd needed. "Hey!" she shouted, not caring for once that his voice had risen two registers. The server looked at her, performed a rather snappy double take, and turned away. The clumsy oaf. Next to him, Ranma saw her mother rest her face in the palm of her hand. "Oh, isn't THIS just wonderful!" Misato jumped to her feet, gathering the waiter's collar in her hands, and started shaking. "Get us some hot water NOW, got it?" "We don't..." "I don't CARE if your hot water is out. Heat some. Set the place on FIRE if you have to, just get him some hot water!" Misato released the man, glaring as he fell backwards and scrabbled away. "Damn." She turned back to regard Ranma, and immediately sat down. "Hey, can't you cover that up?" That? Um... oh. Those. "They ARE covered, MOM. Jeez. I'm not any happier about this than you are, ya know." "I swear, if I ever get my hands on that bastard Genma again, I'm going to run him through the wringer." Misato gestured dramatically at Ranma's feminine figure. "I mean, I thought he'd manage to screw things up, but I never counted on him turning you into a cross-dresser." "I am NOT a cross-dresser, damn it! I am a GUY." Well, not at the moment, but the fact that she LOOKED like a girl didn't mean that she was one. "You really got screwed over at that Jusenkyo place, didn't you?" Misato shook her head. "Almost as badly as Ryoga." ALMOST? She'd show her mother "almost". "At least HE doesn't get bugged when somebody decides they want to date him." Wait a second... Ranma blinked, squinted. The figure who entered the shop hadn't changed. She groaned to herself. "Here it goes again..." "PIG-TAILED GIRL!" Kuno was instantly beside the booth, kneeling and presenting a bouquet of roses. "Once again, the fates have rewarded me with your love! Come, let us date together!" The clueless kendo practitioner looked up, seeing Misato... who had drawn away as if he were some sort of disease-ridden bug, hands firmly locked in warding position. "What IS that thing?" Kuno's jaw fell slack as he took in Misato's outfit. Unfortunately, he managed to recover both his wits and pressed on. "Beauteous one, I regret that I am but one man, and am thus unable to grant you the boon of my devotion. For, alas, my heart and soul have already been given to this lovely flower..." Hm. Misato looked like she was about to vomit. One advantage of Ranma's feminine form... the voice was GOOD at sarcasm. "I thought that you wanted Akane, you two-timer." "Ah, the pure Akane Tendo! My head swims with visions of her beauty. But," and at this, Kuno struck a dramatic pose, "I am not a mere worthless sop, as is the cursed Ranma Saotome, my eternal enemy. My love is vast enough for the both of you!" Okay, that was just about enough. Ranma stood, ignoring yet another shower of praise, and kicked Kuno through the plate glass at the front of the shop. She dusted off her hands and sat back down. "Nice form." Misato lifted one eyebrow. "I can't believe you egg him on like that, though. Won't that hurt?" Egg him ON? "Are you kidding? I'm not sure that Kuno could be killed. Even if you did, you'd never get him to shut up long enough for it to matter. He's one persistent jerk." "Did you think about telling him you were really a guy?" "A few dozen times. He just chalks it up to my 'black, sorcerous nature' and keeps going." Ranma shrugged. "He's annoying, but manageable." That little bit seemed to take her off guard. "Is he some kind of idiot?" "You heard him talking." "I... see what you were talking about. It's too much to hope for that Genma fell in after you?" "What, Pop? Spring of Drowned Panda. Suits him." Misato snapped her fingers. "Well, it's not as good as pond scum, which is what HE deserves." "Pond scum can drown?" Misato chuckled. "I'd find a way." --- Tarou whistled happily, flipping a small wrench in his hand as he walked away from the coffee shop. Amazingly fragile, the circuit breakers on these buildings. He briefly considered whether he was just being petty. After all, it wasn't as if he was GUARANTEEING that fem- boy would get doused in there. Just making it... er, more likely. After all, all work and no play, right? A minute's walk took him back into Nerima. After that, it only took seconds for him to find the plume of Happosai's latest victims. Useful, they were. Of course, he couldn't let them have the dried-up fool... not until Tarou had finished his own business, payback plus interest. He doubted that even the pervert could survive that. --- Misato's jaws creaked with the first yawn of the morning. More sleep. That's what she needed... more sleep. Of course, she wasn't going to get any more sleep. Beer. If she couldn't sleep, she could at least get something to drink. Ah. A plan. She dressed absently, letting her mind wander. The room was a mess. Kind of musty, too. Checking to make sure that she was decently garbed, she flung the window open. Really a nice morning, she thought. The morning air was cool, rather refreshing really, and spiced with the songs of several birds. A black-and-white striped ball edged over the horizon, casting rays of sunshine into the room. Heck, it even smelled cleaner than usual. Wait... the incongruity hit Misato. Her first impulse was to find her empties from last night, count the cans, and set her drinking limit to that number, minus one. After all, there's hangovers, and then there's hallucinations. The second impulse, however, was more intelligent. "Hey, Ryoga, get in here!" Ryoga popped his head through the doorway, studiously not actually looking AT her. Of course he'd be up and around, this early. "Um... yeah, Misato?" She pointed at the variegated ball. "Is my horizontal hold off, or is that..." "Huh?" His eyes traced the path of her finger. "Wow! Now THAT is one ugly blimp." "Blimps aren't round, Ryoga. They're... um..." Misato fumbled for the correct word, missed, and decided to do it the hard way. "...stretched- out, sort of." "They aren't that color, either. What do YOU think it is?" She squinted against the glare of the sun, trying for a better look. "Probably work for us. I mean, what else could it be?" --- "So... it's NOT an Angel?" Ritsuko took a deep breath. One more time... "No, Ryoga, it's not. At least, it doesn't LOOK like one." Asuka half-turned and stomped her foot, facing away from her fellow pilots and towards the cavernous Eva holding bay. "You could have fooled me." "Not like that!" Ritsuko waved a sensor readout at the children. "That... um... ball doesn't have a blue pattern reading. It's weird, but orange, most of the time. Definitely NOT an Angel." Ryoga shook his head. "I don't get this color thing. The Angels are blue, right?" "It's not actually their COLOR, Ryoga. It's just a metaphor. We could call it ‘chartreuse' or ‘mung-flavored' or ‘loud', and it'd mean the same thing." She gestured toward the Eva units. "Anyway, we need you to go give us a closer look at that thing. It doesn't seem to be reacting to stimulus, so there shouldn't be anything to worry about." Ryoga turned to Rei. "The last time they told me that, I got shot right about here," he said, pointing directly over his sternum. "It hurt!" Rei nodded. --- Ryoga nodded to himself. Next time, he would have to remember to avoid swallowing so much LCL. It gave him a bloated feeling that wasn't very comfortable, especially given that he was busy piloting a huge robot through the downtown area. Not that there was any urgency to this operation. All three Eva were launched and told to creep up on the sphere, which had found a nice sunny spot in the middle of town and stopped. Every so often, Ryoga would spot it through a cross street. It was more like a very large optical illusion than a solid ball, in appearance. He fingered the controls, anxiously. The left hand of 01 was clenched around the handle of some kind of sensor thingy. He hadn't followed most of Ritsuko's explanation about what it did, exactly. Misato had told him to take it out there, put it down gently where they told him to, and bring it back. Easy enough. The OTHER hand held some kind of gun. Compared to the ones he'd practiced with, it felt like a toy, even given the fact that it was still several meters long. A quick glance took in the surroundings. This was turning out to be slow work, Ryoga thought. Advance a block. Wait and check. Drag the power cord around obstacles. Find an advertisement sign, follow Hyuuga's instructions on where to go next. Boring. \"Okay, Ryoga, that's it. Set it down... yeah, there. Okay, hang loose for a second."/ Makoto's voice cut out, leaving silence over the link. Ryoga let himself relax, bracing the Eva's shoulders against a nearby arms tower. At least this one didn't shoot at him. In fact, the pattern on it was kind of interesting, how it seemed to flow over its surface... The pattern resolved. Ryoga blinked, once, and nearly scrubbed the Eva's free hand across its eyes. He really hoped that he wasn't imagining things. A stab of his finger opened up an intercom. "Asuka... what does that thing look like?" \"What do you think, idiot...? Oh."/ Rei's voice sounded worried. Well, it sounded quiet, but worried for her, Ryoga supposed... \"Black and white concentric circles..."/ "Bulls-eye." Ryoga looked around the cockpit. No clues as to WHY it would have done that... \"The bastard's taunting us."/ Asuka's face, a tiny figure in his comm window, settled into a dark mask. \"It's like it's daring us to shoot it or something."/ Ryoga nodded. "You two close enough?" \"I'm hung up over here. Gimme a second to change cords."/ \"I will be in position in twenty seconds."/ "Screw it." Ryoga raised his right hand, gripping the firing controls, and the Eva extended its arm. Not much point in waiting, really. If it WAS an Angel, and this thing could hurt it, they'd know from one bullet as easy as three. Besides, if it was like that triangle one, he couldn't let it shoot at Asuka or Rei. He tried not to think about what that entailed as he squeezed the trigger. --- \"Screw it."/ Rei blinked, once. She didn't understand the metaphor, although his tone of voice was quite clear. Exasperation, mixed with boredom and puzzlement. Ryoga was quite likely to soon do something very, very stupid. She paused to reflect; it was almost always quite likely that he would do something stupid, given his education and personality. THIS particular stupid thing would likely fall under the category of things they had been told expressly not to do, like actually firing at the not-Angel. Thus, she was not exactly surprised to hear the sound of gunfire coming from Ryoga's position. The effect, though, was strange. The bullet, instead of deflecting off of a familiar hexagonal atmospheric distortion, passed completely through the sphere. The surface began to ripple, slowly, as if a heavy object had been dropped into a viscous liquid. The wave spread from the point of impact, seeming to rebound off of the opposite side. On its return pass, it... distorted the ring pattern facing Ryoga, the white and black circles forming spirals that swirled in on each other... Whatever it was about to do, it wasn't GOOD. Rei dropped her Eva's electronics pack, ignoring the damage done to the concrete below, and put the left hand against the barrel of her weapon. In her role as support, she had been issued a standard pellet rifle, much heavier than the reduced-weight weaponry carried by 01 and 02. Her finger hesitated on the trigger... was this an appropriate response? Yes; it may disrupt the Angel's activity. Her first shot impacted in the center of her facet of the Angel's pattern... and the waves did not interfere. Glancing to her left, she spotted 01, throwing its arms in front of its face to protect its optics... The pattern spiraled to nothing, leaving the section facing Ryoga a dull, flat black. Then... the building behind 01 faded, becoming black, soupy... the black flowed over 01. Voices poured through her communications line, intermixing... \"...field! That SHADOW has..."/ \"What the hell are you doi..."/ \"Asuka! Rei! MISATO!"/ Ryoga's picture dissolved into static, and the black settled into a pool on the ground. She looked back at the sphere's form, which had settled into... it hadn't settled. She saw the circles deform, the center forming a whirlpool of black and white... centered on her. \"...DRAW! Rei, withdraw, that's an ORDER!"/ Misato's voice was near hysteria, and Rei hesitated. If she didn't move, she was going to be engulfed too... so why couldn't she move? She could. Rei lurched the Evangelion forward, aided by the push from the detaching power cable. Command had disconnected the power. She noted, in the part of her mind that was still thinking, the power countdown timer that sprang to life in the corner of the entry plug. Not a concern, the yellow timer. Red timers were a concern. It fit, almost. Something was wrong with her mental responses, Rei thought. Some kind of physical feedback, shock perhaps? No, the shadow had not come in contact with 00... and as she turned back, partially from reflex, she saw her power cable disappear in a flowing mass of darkness that used to be a power connection building. One voice cut through the audio din. Gendo's voice. "Rei, RUN!" She answered, the words catching in her throat as she turned the Eva away. "Y...yes!" No sooner than she had finished did she match form to action, sprinting the Eva down the empty street. Distantly, she was aware of 02, moving in the opposite direction. The... Angel... followed her, its form changing as it brushed against buildings, leaving skeletal frames exposed in its wake. It was following her, and it was faster than 00 was. A little. \"...ead for the retrieval unit, six hundred meters, straight. RUN!"/ The Eva responded smoothly, following her commands as she hurtled down the street. Five hundred meters ahead, a pair of retrieval rails extended from the steel platform, ready to catch her. Four hundred meters. Three. She felt the contact, a bar of solid fire across her ankle, before she noticed the leading edge of the Angel. The leg found no traction in the nothing-substance of the shadow, and the Eva pitched forward, falling... Rei kept running. Feet found purchase on concrete bare centimeters in front of the mass, and scraped her forward and out of the mire. She kept pumping, as fast as she had when running, faster. It wasn't going to work, it'd catch up to the Eva as soon as it reached the platform... The ache in one shoulder wasn't Rei's, not really, but it bore testament to the damage caused by the friction against concrete. In frustration, Rei flung the damaged arm out, catching the side of the building, and pulled 00 from a pushing slide into a running lunge. She felt something give, heard the wet crunch, and gritted her teeth through the pain. It wasn't going to be enough. She'd reach the platform, only fifty meters away now, but she'd never get down in time... Her left foot, 00's foot, crossed the line from street pavement to steel platform... crossed, and stepped down on the steel... and kept going. The platform wasn't there. Toppling forward, the Eva's chest impacted the opposite rim of the hole, and the Eva fell in... Rei noticed the blackness, heart racing before she realized it to be the blackness of shade, not the absence of being. Somebody had closed the door behind her. She quickly extended the one good arm and both legs of unit 00, halting its fall, and attempted to sit back in her entry plug. Her chest ached, both from the damage dealt to the Eva in her flight, and from the effort of breathing liquid rapidly. It didn't make any sense... despite the Eva's movements, Rei herself had performed almost no physical actions whatsoever. Was it a physical problem? Was it... fear... that she felt? --- Tarou blinked, shook his head, blinked again. None of the monitors changed, and while what he had apparently seen was quite strange even by his own standards, it was still much more plausible than sudden limited delusions. Especially given what such a delusion would say about the state of his subconscious... Not that the realization made him less queasy. If he had to pick the most ignoble way to go, being sucked into a moving shadow while in control of a massively powerful yet ugly mechanical being would rank very near the top, perhaps just under being cursed permanently female and dying while bearing Happosai's child. He cringed at the thought. Misato turned from the screens, fists clenched at her sides, and stalked toward the exit. She barely noticed Tarou as he fell in beside her, both weaving to avoid the massive pile of extra technical equipment that occupied the floor of the command center. Funny, that... all those auxiliary sensor packs, and nobody had thought to patch them in with the rest of the computer equipment. And, of course, the necessary monitoring equipment had been in a small room three floors away. And, also of course, he hadn't been able to make a graceful exit (or even a rude one) before he was drafted into rolling cables and lifting boxes, preventing him from getting a first-hand view of the action outside. Which, of course, was a good thing, in retrospect. He cleared his throat. "So, is pig-boy..." "I don't know." Misato did not turn her head to look at him as the two left the command center and headed for the Evangelion hangars. "What was that, then?" "I don't know that, either." "Well, what..." Misato whirled, not breaking her stride. "I don't KNOW, okay? Damn it, I don't know what just happened, I don't know if he's alive or dead, and I have no damned IDEA what I can do about it right now! Lay off!" Tarou shrank back half a step, less from any threat of physical violence and more from utter confusion. He knew that he wasn't good with women. If he'd forgotten, recent events with Asuka (who almost didn't qualify, not that it was important) had given him a thorough reminder. While there were two or three things he could say, it was unlikely that any of them would help the situation. "So... where are we going?" "The hangars." She sniffed, lightly, but not in the rude/dismissive sense. More like the not quite weepy sense... "Gotta see if Rei is okay." "Okay." He nodded to her back as she left for the elevator. Rather impressive, really. She had no idea what was going on, and she couldn't do anything constructive about the problem, so she picked up and moved to what she could handle. Better than breaking down in a fit of self- pity, anyway. "Tarou?" Misato called from the elevator. "Go bug Ritsuko about it. She's going to have to pull one of her rabbits out of a hat if we're going to get Ryoga back." Tarou nodded again, and as the elevator doors closed, he turned back to the command center. After a very short mental argument, he decided that he really DID want the annoying pig-boy back. After all, somebody had to do the job, and it might as well be the lost lad's responsibility... --- Asuka whistled at the damage to Eva 00. For somebody who'd managed to almost avoid getting hit by the Angel, Wonder Girl had certainly managed to bang up her Eva. Asuka held on to the rail with both hands as the battered 00 dropped the last fifty feet down the recovery shaft, the impact sounding through the metal walkways like a gong. The Eva had scrapes and scratches all over, and the left shoulder assembly was a crumpled mass of armor plate and sticky red fluids. The left arm wasn't much better, with its elbow bent almost one hundred and ninety degrees. That'd take a while to fix. The main chest unit had been dented, a long horizontal impression just below the line of the shoulders. And one foot had been almost scoured, most of the armor simply gone. Asuka got the odd impression of an armored knight with one boot missing. It was still moving, of course; the damage to the recovery system meant that Rei had to move the Eva back under power. Of course, that meant that she'd be synched with the Eva, which meant that all those tears and such would be hurting. Hurting a LOT, that elbow. Still almost one hundred percent better than Ryoga was... That idiot! How dare he get himself killed and leave all of the piloting to her! Not that Asuka minded, exactly, but he still could have been less stupid. She'd have to eat Misato's cooking from now on, she supposed. Maybe Tarou could cook? He'd taken care of himself for a long time... Rei docked Unit 00 in the restraining clamps, extruded her entry plug, and climbed out without bothering to drain the LCL. Asuka turned away, listening to the sound of the liquid breathing fluid spraying from the opened plug and falling to the floor below. She waited, absently noting the retching sounds as Rei brought up what LCL she'd had in her lungs, and what she'd managed to swallow. Disgusting, but Asuka couldn't complain about it, as she'd gone through the same process after every plug test and piloting job. You got used to it. Once she heard the sound of regular breathing, she turned again. "Well, that wasn't exactly according to... mein Gott." Rei was still kneeling on the catwalk, LCL dripping off her suit and hair as she hugged her arms across her chest. She was shaking like a leaf. "Hey, Wonder Girl, you okay?" Rei inhaled, paused, and spoke. "It's shivering... there must be something wrong with the environment control in the entry plug. I don't understand..." Asuka squatted next to Rei, grabbing your shoulder. "But you don't feel cold..." "That's... what I don't understand." Rei turned to look at Asuka. "Is that funny?" "C'mon... get up." Asuka pulled Rei to her feet, giving her a quick tug towards the showers. "You were just scared, that's all." Rei's eyes widened. "Scared? Fear?" "Yeah, whatever you want to call it." Asuka rolled her eyes. "You DO know that you were almost killed by that thing, right? Dead? No more Wonder Girl? That's scary in my book." "I..." Rei looked away. "I wonder why..." It was a good question, but Asuka really didn't feel like getting into the metaphysical aspects of being at the moment. Even more, she didn't feel like rendering them into terms to which Rei could relate. "Don't ask me. What the heck were you thinking? Ryoga, I half expect him to act stupid. But you?" "When two drops of water fall and make ripples, the ripples interfere." Rei's voice was quiet, as usual, and hesitant, as usual, but she wasn't shaking so hard now. "I thought that I could interfere with what it was going to do..." Hm... that could have worked. Except for the fact that it hadn't, of course. "Well, Hibiki is going to chew you a new asshole, as soon as he's done with Ryoga..." Rei went absolutely stiff, eyes vacant. "Just kidding! We know he likes you better anyway." Rei blinked, jerked, and continued walking. "He does not..." Asuka stumbled, nearly falling. She glared back... there was a bump in the walkway, like somebody had stuck their hands in the concrete before it had set. In the molten metal, anyway. She shrugged and kept going, mumbling to herself about the place's strange sense of humor. --- Ryoga flicked off the sensors of his Eva, replacing white noise with some kind of rainbow test pattern. He chuckled to himself. "Not always right, are you, Dad..." He remembered a time, many years ago, when his father had sat him down and told him everything he needed to know about being lost. There was a lot less to it than people thought. And, for the most part, Ryoga had managed to follow them pretty well. Excepting the one concerning water, spring-type, and how not to fall in them. He also remembered one time, after what little school he had attended at that age, coming home and confronting his father. ChibiRyoga: The teacher told us that we should sit still and wait when we get lost! That way, somebody can come and find us. Gendo: Really? Well, son... Ryoga remembered the pride he'd felt, asking his father a real question that he couldn't have known the answer for. He remembered the answer, too. Gendo: You're going to be lost a lot, you know, just like I was. If you just sit still, and don't move, than what are you going to do? How will people know what you're doing if you're not doing it? He chuckled to himself, quietly. "But I can't just move on here, can I, Dad?" Something in the back of his mind tickled, disturbed that he was talking out loud to himself. He ignored it out of habit. After all, he'd had a lot of opportunity to talk to himself over the years. "I have to sit here and wait for you to come get me..." --- Misato frowned. "WHAT was that?" Across the table from her, Ritsuko also frowned. "Look... the concept is very simple. The Angel created some other space, and that's where Ryoga is now. It can kind of turn the barrier on and off, which is how it cut his power cord." "Okay, I follow so far..." "Good. I won't go into exactly how it made the space, mostly because I've no idea myself, and anybody that manages to explain it should be up for a Nobel prize, right after me." Misato quirked her eyebrow. "For what?" "For getting an Eva out of one, naturally. We can put Asuka here," as Ritsuko pointed to one circle on a map, "and Rei here, and have them generate AT fields, and then throw in every N2 bomb we can lay our hands on, and that should disrupt the Angel's space and free Unit 01." "Every... Rit-chan, that's nine hundred N2 bombs." Ritsuko grew a sweatdrop. "Um, yes." "That's the plan? You hit it with N2 bombs? Don't we normally do that when the plan stops working?" "Yes, but that was..." "And do you know how big the CRATER will be?" Ritsuko shook her head. "No, that's the best part, see... we detonate the N2 bombs INSIDE the space, so the damage won't extend beyond it." "Inside the space where Ryoga is." Ritsuko smiled. "Well, I suppose we could disrupt the other one by doing the same thing, but I think we can let it have the foot armor from 00... what?" Misato wasn't military personnel, but she'd encountered a good amount of the training in her job as Operations Commander. She'd seen a few things, one of which was the term used for the results of a large explosive device detonating in an enclosed space with somebody. That term was "chunky salsa". And those devices had only been little grenades, not the big almost-nukes that NERV threw around... "Absolutely not." "We have to get back the Evangelion, Misato! It's the only way I can think of." "And the pilot? Your plan will kill Ryoga, you know!" Ritsuko's eyes hardened. "You don't know that! Okay, granted, if it was anybody else, they'd probably be smeared into a thin paste on the side of the plug wall. But you've seen him! Hell, we could probably hit HIM with the bombs and he'd shrug it off!" "Well, that's ridiculous." Misato lowered her hand, not having realized that she'd been prepared to slap her friend. "Maybe so... but I don't know if he would die from shock. I DO know that he'll die of asphyxiation in two hours if we just sit and do nothing. Unless he's got some sort of meditation technique?" "No." Misato had considered that, actually, but Tarou had said that he'd never even heard of anything like that. He'd also said that he found the concept of Ryoga meditating to be hilarious, even though his eyes were tight when he laughed over it. "Go ahead, but it's your damned responsibility if you kill him." --- The rain... Ryoga couldn't remember rain this hard, beating off of his fur as if he'd stood under a waterfall. The sky, what he could see out of squinted eyes, was black and roiling with clouds. He trotted on, four feet working the dirt path into a muddy trail behind him. The cave in the side of the hill was good... the flickering light from inside better. Somebody had already taken shelter in there, and people usually didn't begrudge a cute little pig the warmth of their fire. Maybe he could even trick them into dumping some hot water over him. Yeah, that would do... he entered the cave. Immediately, the howl of the wind and crashes of thunder muted into the background noise, not quite drowned out by the crackle of a campfire. He took another step in, shaking himself off... and winced as near- steaming water rolled off of his back, momentarily soaking his fur before he HAD no fur. The cave's occupant nodded, saying, "There you go," and placed the teakettle back over the fire. Ryoga sat on a stool-shaped rock, bewildered, and fully clothed. He stared at the other boy... the other boy wearing a yellow tunic, and black pants, and a yellow bandana with black patterns. The other boy sat down himself, smiled, and said "hi", using Ryoga's voice. "Um... um... who... what... how..." The other boy grinned. "Let me work that out. Who is me. I am... well, call me Ryoga. Ryoga Hibiki." Ryoga let out a strangled gasp. "But –I- am..." "Ryoga Hibiki. Trust me, I know... I'm sort of the image of your self. The you that observes you. Follow?" Ryoga stared at the not-Ryoga. "Nope." "Didn't think you would, but you DID ask. As to what..." The not-Ryoga made a circular gesture, indicating the surroundings. "This is an image map of your subconscious. Kind of dark and dreary, but hey, that's you." Okay, Ryoga. You're having a conversation with yourself... except that he's actually sitting over there, and talking back, and he's a hell of a lot smarter than you are too. "I'm... dreaming?" The not-Ryoga rolled his eyes. "If you want to really simplify it, yeah, although I'd personally like to think that I have a hell of a lot more significance than all of those fantasies you keep having about Akane." "Okay... I'm dreaming... how the hell do you know about Akane?" Not-Ryoga leaned back. "Listen close, because this might throw you... I'm the aspect of your self, what THE Ryoga Hibiki is, that examines what that self is. It's kind of my full-time job to look at what you are, you could say." "So, you're NOT me." "No, I AM you, or at least a part of you. See, none of this is actually happening, you're just externalizing an internal dialogue. Um... you're talking to yourself in the dream, and that's why I look like you and know what you think." Ryoga nodded. "And why my clothes came out of nowhere." "Exactly. It's not like I want to see any of that." The not-Ryoga slapped his knee. "Okay, you get it, or close enough that you're satisfied anyway." "I guess so. Um... what are we doing here?" "Dunno. Your guess is as good as mine..." The not-Ryoga trailed off as something moved at the entrance to the cave. A small, black pig crawled towards the fire, bweeeeing for all it was worth. Ryoga recognized himself, again. Reaching for the teakettle, he dribbled out enough hot water for the pig to change... into another Ryoga, of course. This one was glowering at the entrance. "Damn you, Ranma, for trapping me with this curse..." The newcomer seemed to notice the other two. "Oh, hi... who are you?" The not-Ryoga bowed. "I'm Ryoga Hibiki. He's the real Ryoga Hibiki." "So, you're the real Ryoga Hibiki? I thought that I was the real one." The newcomer looked at the not-Ryoga. "He's really the real one?" "Hey! Of course I'm the real one." Ryoga was starting to get angry... if he was dreaming, and talking to himself, at least his self could quit ignoring him. "Yeah, he's the real one." The not-Ryoga motioned for the newcomer to take a seat. "Thanks... it's wet out there. No night to be traveling, even if that damn Ranma's probably doing something evil to Akane." Ryoga leaned over to the not-Ryoga. "So, who's he?" Not-Ryoga answered, whispering. "Um... time for a crash course in Buddhist thought. You know the concept of en?" Ryoga shook his head. "Funny, you've spent enough time crashed out in their temples and such... basically, it means that EVERYBODY that knows you has their own little Ryoga Hibiki running around in their head, kind of like I am with you, and that what the ‘whole' you is, consists of all of them put together." "That's... weird. So, do things really work that way?" "Doesn't matter." The not-Ryoga chuckled. "It's your mind, right? I think this one's the Ryoga Hibiki from Ranma Saotome, given how he keeps going on about the guy." "Makes sense... Ranma is self-centered..." Ryoga shook his head. "Hey, what are you guys talking about?" Ryoga from Ranma slumped down, head resting on hands and elbows on knees. "Nothing important... maybe we'd better wait until everybody gets here." The not-Ryoga refilled the teakettle, although Ryoga couldn't say exactly how he managed it, and stood next to the door. Over the space of five minutes, another four pigs walked in and were doused to humanity. From a bit of quick guessing, Ryoga picked out the one that cracked the rock that he sat on as the Ryoga from Misato. The one that talked like he had Down's syndrome, that one was probably the Ryoga from Asuka. A third had a really strange appearance... skewed perspective, jerky motion, almost inhuman, though everything about it screamed that it, too, was Ryoga Hibiki. Ryoga tagged that one as Ryoga from Rei... he didn't know anybody else that weird. He couldn't quite guess the fourth, who looked almost normal aside from a constantly rumbling stomach. He hissed to the not-Ryoga. "Hey, which one is that?" "Ryoga from Ukyou. After all, she feeds you every time she sees you, almost." The not-Ryoga grinned. "Okay, now that we're all here..." Another Ryoga Hibiki, this one almost normal, walked in from the rain. "Is it all right if I come in... hey, why are you all looking at me like that?" Ryoga nodded to not-Ryoga nodded to Ryoga from Ranma, Ryoga from Ukyou, Ryoga from Rei, and Ryoga from Asuka. That one HAD to be the Ryoga from Akane, to not have the curse... Ryoga waved Ryoga from Akane in and turned back to the fire. "Um..." Ryoga coughed. "What are we doing here, now?" Ryoga from Ranma spoke first. "I'm... drifting. Everything I used to live for, it's gone now. There's a few new things... but I don't know if it's enough to go on. I don't even know if I WANT to go on..." Ryoga from Rei spoke next. "The feelings... I feel sad, I feel happy, angry, confused, I'm not sure where they are coming from, or why I'm feeling the way that I do. I don't know what's going on, and I can't do enough about it..." At this, the not-Ryoga winked, jerked a thumb, and smiled. "But remember to consider the source, everybody." "I... hid something for so long, and it was hard... but now that it's out, maybe I can live again, huh? But I feel wrong, feeling like that? What's wrong with me?" Ryoga from Akane bent his head, resting it on his knees, which he had drawn up under him. "I just don't know anymore..." Ryoga from Ukyou nodded. "I know what you mean. Hell, I've never been able to try to get what I want; now I don't even know what I want anymore. It's like my life ended, but it's still going on and I don't know what to do anymore..." The six other Ryogas present turned to look at Ryoga from Asuka. "My turn? Um... I do dumb things. Sometimes it's because I don't know better, and sometimes I do know better, but I do them anyway! Is that dumb, or what? I don't want to act stupid..." Ryoga shook his head. "What did all that mean?" The not-Ryoga frowned. "Those, they're people's representations of you, what they think you ARE of a sorts. Everyone, they're worried about you. I sure am, which means that you're worried about yourself. Right now, you're wondering what you can do about it." Ryoga nodded. "Yeah." "Don't YEAH, I'm the you looking at you, remember? I don't guess wrong about that kind of thing." "You know, this is almost making sense..." The not-Ryoga sighed. "Glad you appreciate the effort. Not easy, explaining deep philosophy to, well, me." "So, what do I do about it?" "What, like I have all the answers?" The not-Ryoga's eyes narrowed. "I can tell you what's important to you, what you're thinking about, what you're afraid of." Ryoga's sigh was echoed in seven throats, as each one shifted closer to the warm fire. "Okay," Ryoga said, "But I know that already. What's important... Akane. Not much else." The seven nodded as one. "I'm afraid for her, about her, over her. Over me, right?" The not-Ryoga nodded, smiling. "Okay, there's that. Not to mention what would happen if she found out..." "Found out about what?" The other six Ryogas all turned on the Ryoga from Akane, simultaneously raising their fists. "NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!" Outside the cave, something slipped on the wet rocks. Ryoga stood, his form silhouetted in the entrance before the driving rain for a moment, before he resumed his cursed form again. "Wha... what the hell was that?" "Stuff it, will ya? Something's going on..." Ryoga's awareness of the cave faded, the voices lost in the wind and water, as he searched for the source of the sound. It wasn't far... he was on it, looking down at a person standing drenched in the rain. He couldn't see her features clearly, only that it was a woman, as she raised her arms to the sky. Her mouth opened, and she shouted at the top of her lungs... "WHERE THE HELL AM I NOW?" The world dissolved in white light. --- Aoba looked up from his screens, glancing around the command center. They were almost ready to start, he thought. Misato directing the two remaining Eva, Ritsuko doing whatever deus ex machina she had planned, Ibuki helping her, Hyuuga doing communications and control. Which, naturally, left the most fun job for himself... somewhere, near the docks at Yokohama, there was a small arcade with an ancient Missile Command machine on which his three initials still flashed, for over twenty years. There hadn't BEEN docks in Yokohama then, of course, but... This wouldn't be all that different. Never thought that skill would come in handy, before. His screen showed fourteen different fighter wings, each loaded with dozens of very destructive weapons, and it was his job to make sure that each and every one ended up inside the black mass resting under the sphere that really wasn't the Angel. It shouldn't be any problem, really, so long as no idiot pilot aimed for the sphere in the first place. Difficult to screw up, really. That was a good thing, though. Before she went out, Asuka had learned that he was guiding the bombs in, and told him that if he should let one miss and damage her Eva, she would personally see another bomb guided somewhere not scatologically possible. The first flight grouping would launch, from that point, in thirty seconds or so... he began frantically typing into the keyboard, ensuring that seventy weapons made the trip without bumping into each other or going off early. Fifteen seconds... ten... five... he finished with three to spare, and he leaned back to watch the fireworks. The first plane flew through the firing space and didn't release. Neither did the second, or the third. In fact, the entire wing was pulling up and away from the target. He fumbled for his radio, preparing to find out what the hell was going on, and in the process glanced back at the main observation screen. Oh. That would account for it. The big sphere, only moments ago covered with white stripes, had gone flat black. He keyed all of the rest of the planes off, considering what had happened the last time they'd fired something into this particular Angel. Ritsuko... she was staring at her display, mouth hanging in shock. Something bulged on one side of the sphere. The material... whatever it was... stretched, bulged, and tore. Red fluid jetted from the wound as if there was a tear in an artery. The wound widened, as two hands pushed left and right. Through the fountain, something came out... Aoba spun in his chair, looking at Gendo. "An egg?" The director's face widened into a slight grin. "A door." Aoba's face turned a sickly shade of pale green as he stared at the following carnage. He heard a few sounds from his fellow technicians, one that he was sure was Ibuki losing her lunch, but he didn't look away from the screen. --- Rei winced, looking out over the square where a berserk Evangelion had disposed of an Angel two hours before. Rei had not bothered to form an opinion on most of life... the act of judging certain activities as desirable or undesirable, when chance or logic caused them to occur, had always struck her as irrational. Life was life, this was self- evident. Whether she bothered to like it, or not, never seemed important. She didn't like this. It was perfectly reasonable to take Ryoga to see what had happened. He had no memory of the minutes before the Angel's death, as she had expected. The physical travel had not been onerous or tiring in any way. The scene, though... red, it was red. Not just the bright red of Unit 02's external coloration, not even the deep red of a sunset, but the red of drying, half-coagulated blood. She tried not looking at it... which proved to be impossible; gouts of the stuff had drenched every nearby building, every street, every tree, until it seemed that the earth itself had red soil. Even the sky seemed somehow tinted by the red. She tried closing her eyes... it removed the image of blood, but not the coppery taste in the back of her throat, nor the soft sounds made by her footsteps as she walked beside Ryoga, wet sounds as the pavement seemed to cling to her shoes. Nor did it remove the memories of blood. She heard Ryoga speak. "And it was here? Ripped itself out?" She nodded, once, not looking at him. He continued. "This is..." His voice trailed off, and she heard him whispering, trying to find words. None seemed to fit. "Ryoga..." She sneezed, then scrubbed furiously at her nose. Blood was red from iron; should it not then smell like iron? No, it was copper. "Are you... finished?" "Yeah." Ryoga turned towards her, and she opened her eyes long enough to take in his worried expression as he looked at her. "Come on, let's go back." Misato's car was still a block away when Rei took a deep breath. Once away from the stench, the air was... more pure. Well, of course it was more pure, it was away from the stench, but... there seemed something now different about the ordinary air. Ryoga noticed the change. "That was... horrible." Rei nodded. "I will not return here." "Me neither." They walked in silence, shoes whispering against uncontaminated asphalt, for a few seconds. Ryoga clenched a fist at his side and squeezed his eyes shut. "Rei... Misato told me what you did. Next time... don't. Just go." What did he mean by that? If she just went, how could... Ryoga's intent became clear. "I will protect you." It was not the first time she had said it... perhaps the Angel attack had affected his long-term memory? Ryoga's laugh held no trace of humor. "I'm not worth protecting. Not if it hurts you. Next time, go." "I will not." It was the first time Rei had ever heard those words. She had never considered saying them before, never considered a situation in which they could possibly be useful. Ryoga turned, not pausing in his stride, and his eyes were wide with some emotion Rei did not recognize. "Why not? How can you..." Her shrug cut him off. "I won't let you die out there." "It wouldn't matter." Rei kept her eyes open, staring straight ahead, fixing the image of Misato's car in her mind. When she got home, she would shower, even though she had before leaving the pilot's ready room. The ridiculous image of her washing away the memories of blood came to her... it was foolish, and she did not understand, but she would shower anyway. --- Ukyou hummed cheerfully as she finished tidying the restaurant from a busy day. Everything would be just so, ready for the next morning, as it had been that morning, and the morning before, and the morning after the next as well. Everything in perfect order, perfect harmony. What a farce. She had never considered this outcome, in all her years of dreaming, all her thoughts. That she had changed her claim from revenge to marriage seemed not to matter. She had dreamed of victory, standing over Ranchan's blood-soaked body, her spatula raised triumphantly in the air. She had dreamed of their wedding day, and the night after, with much the same frenzied enthusiasm. She had even dreamed of defeat, her life ending in a desperate attempt to rid the world of the evil of the Saotome clan, sacrificing her very life to see her opponents laid waste as well. It held a kind of honor, that end. She had never dreamed of this end. This didn't even have honour to redeem it. It had taken her a week, one of crying and weeping, fits of anger, even closing the shop one day, for her to accept what she had heard from Ran-ch... Ranma. Belief had come first, that he had meant the words, that he had loved Akane more. That he DID love Akane more. There was fury, mad plans to reunite them thrown out, one unworkable plot after another. Depression had followed, and she shied away from remembering the dark thoughts of one night. Now, she had accepted... and the pain in her soul was gone. She could feel the hole, the pain draining from the same rent that had been made when Ranma had rejected her for the final time. She felt... empty. A rustle at the front door of the shop brought her head up, alerting her to the presence of a visitor. She thought about picking up her battle spatula, and decided against it. What could come after her now, to hurt her more? She recognized the danger in that line of thinking, tried to make the effort to care. A stray thought brought a snort of laughter to her. With Ranma gone, it was highly unlikely that she would ever need to use her skill in combat again. That's it, girl. Concentrate on the positives. The girl's head that popped in the half-open door seemed oddly familiar... recognition hit Ukyou with both fists. A visit by Tsubasa Kurenai, while potentially good for working off aggression, could hardly qualify as a positive. The cross-dresser came in, bent nearly double around something that he clutched to his side. "Hey, Tsubasa... when you wake up, and your life is over, and it still goes on, what do you do with it, huh?" "Came... to see you." Ukyou's mind idly noted that Tsubasa was getting a bit more daring in his selection of outfits. Even Ranma would blush to be seen in that shade of red... with yellow streaks... that dress had been yellow. "Wanted... to see you one more time, Ukyou-sama." She crossed the few feet separating them, pulling his body fully inside and laying him on the floor. He had gathered the fabric of his skirt around the left side of his waist, where the material was darkest red, several patches a brighter red where the saturated dress failed to staunch even more blood. She fumbled with a cloth, tying it into a bandage, and lifted the skirt away from the wound. Oh. She let the scarf fall, and gathered his head in her hands. His face was pale, a dull white against the thin trickle of blood coming from his mouth. "What happened? Who did this to you?" She felt herself going numb, refusing to accept... no. It was real. There wouldn't be any helping Tsubasa, not anymore. He chuckled, his chest rasping. "Not exactly what I had in mind... dear Ukyou-sama... but it'll do. It'll... do." Tsubasa closed his mouth, and his eyes, and Ukyou was not sure whether the tremor that passed through him was his, or her own. --- Tarou clapped Ryoga on the back. "Don't EVER do that again, pig-boy." The two sprawled on the couch, idly watching television, just catching what little of the battle had been allowed on the late news. Ryoga chuckled to himself. "Keep that up and I'll start thinking that you care." "I do care, stupid." Ryoga's neck whipped around. "After all, if you croak, who am I going to freeload off of? Not that I need to freeload, of course." Tarou's own chuckle was deeper, richer with humor and experience. Well, he liked to think so, at any rate. "Thanks." Ryoga raised the remote control, looking at the screen. The announcer had just finished the bare-bones account, which was barely recognizable as a battle unless you happened to already know what happened. "Next, in local news, a bear broke free from an animal show and attacked a nearby street vendor. Fortunately, the diners were saved when a young martial artist intervened. We managed to secure a short interview with..." "Boooo-ring." Ryoga's thumb stabbed down on the "off" button. --- Hyuuga sat down on the steps leading to his apartment. Despite his fatigue, he really didn't want to go inside right then. Instead, he held his head in his hands and worried. Misato. He'd been an idiot to give up Misato. She was so full of... he didn't know what it was. Life. Energy. It was enough reason to go on living, he reasoned, just to be around her. He knew he wasn't the only one to see it. He had seen the reflection of it in Aoba's step, the three walking from one part of the complex to another... in the way the pilots smiled and nodded whenever she asked something of them... in the way Ritsuko's barbs, normally razor-sharp, seemed to slide off like water on a duck's back. Never in Gendo's eyes, though. And he'd thrown it away in a fit of pique. It didn't matter that nobody knew about it... well, nobody but that odd Chinese guy that obviously didn't know why he decided to stay around Misato's place even as he, too, was affected by her spirit. It really didn't matter. For a moment, an instant, a week really, he'd betrayed her in his heart. He wasn't worthy of her anymore. And for what? He could be honest with himself... there weren't any other prospects for him anyway. The voice, when he heard it, was sandpaper on wood, dry as a desert. "Fancy meeting you here." He didn't look up. "I live here... why would it be a "fancy" anything?" "So it is. You don't look like much, son-in-law." His mind registered the non sequitur, and he glanced up at the speaker. Not very far up. She was a shrunken dwarf, desiccated, with wrinkles piling over creases covering lines, and crow's feet that would have fit a roc. The shapeless covering that she wore bore a symbol that he did not recognize, and the dried staff held in her arm was distinguishable from her skin only by the angle with which she held it. He momentarily wondered if he had encountered a dwarfish Ent, idiotic as that might sound, before he remembered the first oddity. "I'm a bachelor." It... no, she... chuckled. "Wouldn't have it any other way. Greetings, young Makoto Hyuuga. I am Cologne." "Good evening, Cologne-san. Pleased to meet you." He bowed slightly, made less impressive by the slump already present in his posture, and blinked. "But if you knew that I was a bachelor, why did you..." "I spoke of the future, of course. You should feel blessed. Not many men are possessed of the strength, courage, and wisdom to defeat an Amazon in combat." Amazon... Amazon... he'd heard that word used recently... oh, no. "Um... if this is about the other night... I'm really sorry. I assure you, Cologne- san, that I didn't have any intention of hurting her. It just sort of..." He began flailing with his hands, then stopped, realizing that giving the girl's grandmother a blow by blow account of the night may not have been a good idea. He revised that age estimate to "great-grandmother". "It was a complete accident. I'm really sorry." He braced himself for the retribution... The crone raised an eyebrow. "Really? An accident? You almost killed her." "I'm really, really sorry!" Hyuuga managed to stop himself from trembling. Sure, his dignity wasn't worth a wet rag, but at least he could stop from throwing it at the feet of this Cologne-person. "You're polite, at least. Well... either you are a true master, at such a young age, skilled even to the point where you can mask an awesome fighting spirit from me even at this close an examination, or you have an incredible dose of luck. My vote, son-in-law, is not on the first." "Luck! Yeah, that was it... pure luck. I'm lucky sometimes." Hyuuga realized that he was babbling, chalked it up as a perfectly normal reaction for somebody that was about to die... they'd told him that the Amazons were all ferocious warriors, and now he remembered the sex- changing one talking about some old bat that kept on meddling. There was something else, but he couldn't make his mind dredge it up. "That's good! Luck can be a valuable asset. So, boy, are you smart?" Hey, now... "Of course! I finished second in my class. Twice." "Not first?" "Why be first?" He shrugged. "The number didn't matter back then anyway." "That's also good." She shifted, the stick blurring as it shot toward his face... the pointy end parted his lips at the corner of his mouth and pulled. "Good teeth, as well. Okay, you pass." "Pass? What pass?" Cologne sighed. "You will marry my great-granddaughter Shampoo, as soon as she recovers from the injuries that you gave her. It is a good match... every quality that you seem to have is one that her end of the family line seems to lack. We'll be seeing you, son-in-law." She jumped, her form melding with the late-night shadows at the top of the building. He felt the blood drain from his face. Now he remembered, remembered how everybody had laughed as the cute one with short hair had told him that he'd find himself married if he didn't watch out. They all seemed to find that one funny... he buried his head in his hands again, set to resume moping, and couldn't manage to work up the self-pity. A minute later, he was in his apartment, sleeping. --- Akane blinked, scrubbing sleep away from her eyes, and stared at the clock. It was twenty minutes past midnight, and she KNEW that something had been tapping at her window. The inconsiderate jerk. Ranma continually claimed that he wasn't interested in peeping, and that he could easily wait until after marriage, and even if he'd wanted to, she wasn't sure that she would have refused if he'd asked... but to peep at her window this late? She'd show him this time. Rising from bed, she rolled from the covers to the foot of the bed, one hand snatching her kendo sword from its customary spot against her footboard. Another moment, and she had spun full in front of the window, thrown it open, and brought the bundle of thin lathes down on... wait. Ukyou stood on the windowsill of her second- story room, shivering from cold. Except that it was still fall, and not that cold outside. And she didn't have that huge metal spatula with her. "Can... can I come in?" Akane took a deep breath and dropped the kendo sword to the floor. "Um... okay. I thought you were..." She managed to catch herself before she pronounced Ranma's name. Mentioning him, or their marriage, to Ukyou would be cruel. Even with the pause, something shifted in Ukyou's demeanor. "Are you okay, Ukyou?" "Thanks." The chef swung her legs over the sill, climbed inside the room, and closed the window and curtains behind her. Akane thumbed on her desk lamp... something WAS wrong with Ukyou. Something about her eyes, that kept darting around the room without really seeing anything. "Tsubasa came by tonight." "The cross-dressing freak?" Akane grinned. "I hope you taught the boy a lesson." Ukyou stared up at Akane's face, eyes blank. "Tsubasa's gone, Akane." "Gone? That's great! He won't..." Akane's reply petered out as she looked more closely at Ukyou's expression. "Um... when you mean gone, you don't mean GONE, do you?" Ukyou nodded. "Oh, no... he didn't try to..." Akane didn't quite know how to phrase the question. Did he try to force himself on her? Did she kill him to stop him? "Something had hurt him, Akane. He came in, and I snapped at him, and he lay down on the floor and bled to death. I never... he didn't deserve... he was smiling, Akane. He was smiling at me." Akane knelt next to Ukyou, wrapping her in a hug. Tsubasa, dead. Akane's memories of the pervert were not fond, true, but he didn't even deserve to get hurt. He was just a little too motivated towards his hobby, that was all. He might have even gotten better... "It's okay." Ukyou gave no indication that she had noticed. "The police came, and they said that they had heard me screaming, and they looked at a lot of things. And then they took him away, and now he's gone. I didn't mean it, I really didn't mean it when I said that!" "It's okay, it's okay... it wasn't your fault." "I really didn't want to go back there tonight." Ukyou smiled, but her voice wavered on the edge of tears. "It was... I couldn't stay there tonight. At first, I thought of..." She paused, but Akane heard Ranma's name as clearly as if she'd said it, in her Kansai accent. She probably would have called him Ranchan, too. "But I can't see him either, right now. Can I stay here tonight?" Akane nodded. "Of course. I can't believe... how? Why?" The nod seemed to infuse something into Ukyou. The coldness in her eyes receded slightly, enough to take away the war-refugee look. "Really? Thanks, thanks a lot... I just couldn't think of anywhere else to go." "It's okay. What are friends for?" Akane's words surprised even her, and Ukyou's smile firmed as she returned Akane's hug for a few seconds. "Here, let me get you a spare futon and some blankets." Ukyou didn't let go of Akane's arm. "No, I'm okay... I really don't want to be alone right now, okay?" "It's okay." Akane pulled Ukyou onto the bed, and gathered the comforter around them, as Ukyou leaned on her and cried. --- Misato's mind blurred, dulled by amounts of alcohol beyond the tolerance of even her toughened liver. The "thank God that you're still alive" celebration that she'd thrown for Ryoga had lasted for an hour, in which Misato had stopped drinking only to breathe, and most of the air from that devoted to informing Ryoga what a stupid mistake he had made and how glad that she was that it hadn't killed him. Rei seemed subdued, even compared to her normal introverted behavior, and thus Misato had spared her from any further tirades. After all, there wasn't any point in bawling her out in the first place. Asuka and Tarou had both dropped the sarcastic act, even if only for a night, and both had drank enough to make headway into her second rack of beer. And something had just pulled her from what should have been the sleep of the soused. That something was her pocket phone, ringing in priority pattern. She mumbled as she managed to fish it from the pile of clothing at the end of her futon. "please don't let be an angel please don't let it be an angel please don't let it be an angel please... Hello?" Gendo's voice crackled from the receiver. "Katsuragi?" "Speaking." She managed to force the alcohol-born slur from her voice, if not her posture. "You are familiar with the transient known as Pantyhose Tarou?" She imagined Gendo's face wearing a grim smile at that name. "Yes..." "And your son, Ranma Saotome?" "Hell yes." Okay, she was drunk, she was tired, protocol be damned. "What about them?" "You are to inform them both that they are to be activated as Evangelion pilots, for units 04 and 03 respectively. Have them report to HQ as soon as they are notified. And..." "Yes?" The import of the message failed to penetrate the haze around Misato's consciousness. There was a moment of silence over the line. "No, that is all." Gendo's voice cut off, and the connection cut off. "Okay, sir, firs' ting inna morning..." Misato's head hit the pillow, drowning out the rest of her reply, and the phone dropped from her hand. Sleep... first, she'd worry about sleeping, then about telling Gendo's plumber that the hot water pipes were busted or whatever he'd been talking about. --- End of part 17 These are starting to get longer... which may reason why it is taking so danged long to write them. As usual, e-mail any comments to akent@pdq.net, and feel free to make suggestions, PLEASE! I figure I'm at the half-way mark, give or take five episodes.