Yes. It's done. Finally.
---
It had been a magnificent fortress, one that those inhabiting it believed had no equal. It harbored within the secrets to mankind's redemption, and the instruments of its damnation.
But as any fortress, it was not impenetrable. Even the strongest of walls could be brought down with enough effort, and there'd certainly been enough effort invested in brining these down.
Still, it had served its intended purpose admirably.
And now that the war's penultimate act was playing out within those very walls, it would serve one more time.
But serve whom?
---
Demonbane Ltd.
presents
Incarna
two - (a)moral dilemma.
a follow up ficlet to the SI story Machine Spirit
by Griever
---
The noise was horrendous, as the two giants clashed. Armor against armor. It was a truly vicious looking struggle, even despite the fact that one was fighting with an almost mechanical, utterly detached manner. Like a puppet.
While the puppeteer stood, or rather floated, a ways away, partially distracted by the huge figure of the Second Angel, Lilith, pinned to her cross.
***

I ignored the klaxons, the blaring alarms ... they weren't really important at the moment, save for what I intended them to be. A distraction.
There was a nagging feeling running through my body, prickling along the surface of the skin like a million needles, and a spike of pain burning in my mind.
The noise of rapid footfalls came from below, and passed my location without slowing down. Good. At least I wouldn't be dealing with security. Normally, it wouldn't have been much of a problem, but right now I doubted I could muster up enough concentration to produce a minor slap effect with the Field without taking a risk at losing my mind.
Then again, sometimes risks were something you had to take into account to get anywhere.
I'd been keeping myself as still, mentally speaking, as possible for the past week. With good reason. Everything else aside, this body had been created from the Nagisa template, and despite everything it still was kin to the SEELE agent/final Angel. Hence my lack of activity save for extremely brief and discreet probes ever since the arrival of Kaworu Nagisa, Fifth Child, seventeenth Messenger ...
After counting to twenty, listening all the while, and wincing every two seconds or so as the effort of keeping my Field as tightly wrapped around my body and as 'still' as possible against the distant harmonics of Nagisa's own became noticeably harder, I moved.
Keeping from synchronizing my own Field with that of the Angel hadn't been this hard previously, but then, this was the first time that he used it at full strength since he'd arrived. The natural resonance my own would have taken on if I hadn't consciously stopped it would have been a surefire way of giving away my presence and position. To Nagisa at least.
The grating fell away after a swift kick.
Immediately thereafter, I retrieved, armed, and dropped a can that I hoped was tactical smoke, into the corridor beyond and below. Luckily, it didn't explode, in flashbang manner or one of the far messier conventional grenades. Meant I really did have a hardwired knowledge of Japanese other than the spoken kind floating around in my brain. Handy. Come to think of it, my German had gotten slightly sharper as well. Might be some of the basic preparation of the body coming through ...
I let myself drop, falling into the passageway with all the grace of a sack of potatoes, coming to a relatively quiet three point landing in the midst of an expanding cloud of thick smoke.
Now came the hard part, I realized, and bit my lip hard enough to draw blood. The physical pain let me keep my focus, helping to keep me from submerging my Self in the Angel's A.T. Field as I used my own for the first time in days.
I was blind. A moment later, I was still blind ... but I was also touching everything within a radius of ten meters or so, which, let me tell you, feels utterly and totally unlike anything I'd experienced before. It was also entirely unlike the imitation Daredevil sense I'd experienced as part of the D.D.'s radar/lidar package.
The moment those thoughts went through my mind, perception shifted, and as suddenly as the scale of touch had increased exponentially I was presented with shades of physical shapes overlaid on top of the smoke-obscured hallway. Very odd, since there was no color, and every plane seemed more or less light gray, but I could work with that. I was still 'feeling' them, too, but less intensely ...
Pulling myself back together, I continued on, walking in the direction the security goons had come from. If what I'd gathered about the place's layout was accurate, I should be coming up to ...
... I pressed myself against the wall, inching towards the corner, moving with the expanding cloud. Normally, I could have put the two guards sitting in the room beyond to sleep with some effort, but with the amount of concentration the simplest uses of the Field currently demanded of me that was very unlikely to be a possibility. Luckily, there were other options.
Two further smoke grenades were lobbed into the room, and I unlimbered the length of steel I'd kept slung across my back.
Then, as the two guards - regular security, not Section 2 - startled at the hissing cylinders, I stepped from concealment and fired. Pumped the reload mechanism. Fired again.
Two heavy thumps went unheard over the ringing in my ears that the two shots had resulted in, in this confined space. I could tell the bodies fell, however. Turning around to face the way I'd come I aimed and fired two more times, then stepped into the guard room of the brig, and fired once more. Electricity crackled for a few moments, as three cameras were smashed by the high impact rounds.
Riot ammo or not, shotgun shells are heavy buggers.
***
Silence, with the faint whine of the alarm from past the door. She didn't really care. There were few things she still cared about.
There was no more real purpose, no reason she saw to stay alive. Considering her delusions had been stripped from her for a long while now, but that she'd only recently actually took a good hard look at what she'd become, this wasn't necessarily surprising.
Few things hit somebody as hard as the realization of hopelessness.
She didn't look up at the loud thumps from outside, or the sound of something hitting the door of her cell.
However her attention was drawn when the cell opened, thick smoke billowing to fill the confined space.
In moment, it was enough to block her vision, and she recoiled when a hand clamped onto her arm.
"In case you hadn't noticed, this is a jailbreak," she heard over the din. "Coming?"
The figure was, judging by size, barely as tall as she ... and that was all she could tell with the smoke in the way and the baggy tactical gear it wore in the way.
It took her a moment to consider the offer, or was that threat? With the shotgun the figure held, it wasn't obvious which.
Still, considering the likely alternative, this one offered more options. Or so it seemed.
She made her decision.
***
Gendo Ikari was not what one would call an excitable person. This hadn't always been the case. It was something that had been brought about by circumstance and necessity. Put plainly, he could not afford to be.
There were very few people who could claim to be able to read his moods. One of them was his right hand, and even he, despite the fact that they'd worked together for over a decade, and had known each other longer than that, couldn't always be certain as to the NERV Commander's state of mind.
Now, though, agitation could be plainly identified in his manner.
It had nothing to do with the way the scenario - Gendo's scenario, not SEELE's - was turning out. SEELE's hybrid had played its part according to his expectations, so he couldn't complain.
No. What had him so upset was something that had transpired while that particular scene was playing out.
During the event, someone had paid a visit to the Brig, and said place was short one prisoner now.
A somewhat unstable, but still vital and possibly useful prisoner.
Surveillance devices that would have recorded the entire thing had been either destroyed, or momentarily obfuscated by smoke, and the only clues as to the perpetrators had been delivered after an analysis of the injuries suffered by the guards. They corresponded with those caused by standard issue NERV Security riot shells for the 12gauge shotgun. No other clues had been found. Not even brass.
No remains that could be checked for serial numbers, or anything of the sort.
Oh, there was no doubt that the perpetrator _would_ be found. Eventually.
But it was that 'eventually' which, Fuyutsuki, NERV Vice-commander, knew was the problem.
Time was something they could scarcely afford to waste, especially now.
Ritsuko Akagi had to be found and retrieved as soon as possible ... that, or be eliminated.
Considering the irritation, though that might be putting it mildly, which her escape had caused the Commander, Fuyutsuki was willing to place his bets on the latter option.
***
"It is done," the monolith 'spoke', a crimson 01 on its face marking it as the representation of the Chairman of SEELE.
The chamber, or rather, the holographic representation of a mostly black, seemingly unlimited space, was filled with a tense anticipation that, despite the place's virtual nature, appeared almost palpable.
They'd all been waiting for this moment. For a long, long time. Years. Over a decade.
In some cases, even longer.
"What of Ikari?" came a query from one of the others, and Lorenz Keel, SEELE Chairman and chief motivator, allowed himself a smile.
"He has, of course, a scenario of his own in mind. One that does not necessarily coincide with the one we have worked for," there was no doubt about the sort of expression that adorned his face as he said these words, monolith aside.
"It isn't something we haven't taken into account," answered one of the others, voicing Keel's thoughts to the letter.
"Yes," the Chairman confirmed. "everything is falling together, as we'd predicted, as was foretold."
"So, even with this most recent delay ..." number 05 trailed off.
"Inconsequential," was the reply. "Tabris has fulfilled his purpose."
"Still, what of the missing hybrid?" number 11 queried.
"We shall keep alert," the smirk in Keel's voice was, understated as it tended to be, still clearly recognizable. "If nothing else, this will make sure we are not complacent. At this stage, though, Instrumentality is assured."
***
Welcome to the insanity that is my life, please mind the gap, that first step's a killer.
At least, I thought it had been, once upon a time and a few dementia to the side.
Still, sometimes I'm at my best when driven by a lack of logic and an overabundance of inspiration. Never let it be said that I let myself be deterred by reason and common sense.
Those few bits of the usual chaos that is my mind in full ramble go, I would like to think, a long way towards explaining the twisted path of consideration that resulted in myself, wearing scrounged up NERV security riot gear - or at least pieces of the complete kit - and still occupying quarters within the Nagisa suit, sitting opposite a frazzled looking blonde.
It had taken a bit to convince her that, no, I was not, in fact, one Kaworu Nagisa. Then I'd gotten talking ...
Ritsuko Akagi was, for all her faults, in possession of a brilliant scientific mind. The fact that there was a bit of precedent involved, what with an Angel having played pandimensional hopscotch with the EVAs before, helped. Still, even if she did consider me crazy afterwards, playing the revenge card would have gotten to her anyway. As things stood, it had been merely another thing that sweetened the deal.
I honestly couldn't say whether or not the good doctor still cared for her life. One moment it seemed to be the first thing on her mind, the next it was as far from it as it could get.
In all, not the most stable person I'd ever met.
That was alright by me. In a way, for the person I found staring out at me from every mirror I looked into, insanity was sort of in the job description.
Still, work - if it could be called that - was progressing steadily. Say what you will, the woman could focus.
The old adage of 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned' seemed to be holding true.
It was also nice to be able to venture out into the rest of Dogma. As long as I kept out of sight, the fixes the good Doctor had provided to the MAGI's security overlay wouldn't alert anyone of my presence.
Slowly, painfully so in fact, things were taking shape.
***
"The graveyard is still under surveillance," Akagi said, brining up the schematics onscreen. The good Doctor had managed some impressive things with just the substandard and mostly obsolete equipment left behind in these older corridors. Whether they'd been left by accident, or nobody cared enough to have them removed, either way they were a blessing of sorts.
"What do you get out of it," she'd asked me, frowning, during that first conversation a fortnight ago. "Are you doing this out of the goodness of your so called heart?"
Bluntness had been the order of the day. Still was. I'd long since four subtlety took too much time when you negotiated from a superior position and with nothing to lose. Or pretended you had nothing to lose.
"This is easier," I'd flatly stated. Prompting the raise of an eyebrow, and a slight inhale. I didn't really mind the cigarette smoke. No, I tell a lie. I didn't particularly care for it, but it was a negligible bother all the same. Not like this body could get lung cancer. Not like it really needed lungs, either.
But I digress.
"Yes, easier," she'd given me a look that said just how much she believed me as she repeated my words. Not much at all. Couldn't really blame her. "Breaking someone out of NERV's brig and then crawling through several hundred meters of maintenance ducts ..."
"More elaborate, yes. Harder?" had been my retort. "That's debatable. If all goes well, things are going to blow up in faces, houses of cards will fall together, and the Stay Puff Marshmallow Man will stay puff and locked in the basement. If not, the world goes to hell, and I still have a chance at getting out of here."
"Is that supposed to make me feel better about this?"
"It's half a chance more than you had before."
We'd left it at that.
My mind snapped back to present considerations and problems, leaving the memories be where they slept, waiting for another moment of recall.
The EVA graveyard. I'd wanted to catch a glimpse of it for a while now, and equally dreaded and anticipated the moment. No matter. I needed to get past it, and with Akagi running interference with the MAGI it became actually doable.
I wasn't made for this cloak and dagger crap. Honestly, give me a truckload of C4 and be done with it.
Still, necessity and all.
"You'll need to get to the maintenance route on the other side from the entry point," the schematics rotated. "Then it's a climb up, until the cross section comes up. The cages aren't that far off, after you get there. According to the MAGI, you're looking for Number Eight Cage."
"What state's she in?" I asked, committing the route to memory. As best I could. I'd have a map, yes, but it was better to be safe than sorry in this case.
"Supplements from the purged biomass of 03 are being adapted, apparently," she informed me. "Not in working order yet, since a fair portion of the muscle fibers needs to be regrown or mended, but that shouldn't matter too much at this point. If you can follow through with what you claim you can do."
I was concerned about this as well, I admitted to myself. Healing my own body was comparatively trivial, a remaining 'instinct' from having a nanomachine maintenance system during my time as a big, clunky piece of metal. Angel physiology was such that, thanks to the S^2 organ/engine, regeneration was merely a matter of appropriate material supplements being present.
Extending said effect to something of admittedly similar genetic makeup, but so much larger scope ... or rather, stimulating the appropriate bits of its physiology, which would then further the progression of a regenerative process seemed daunting at best. Impossible at worst.
That aside, making Unit 00, what was left of it, usable again was not our prime concern at the moment. A related matter took up most of our minds' attention.
***
She knew the boy could not be working for SEELE. Oh, there was a great gulf between 'working for' and 'being played by' - she knew, she'd experienced both - but it seemed unlikely that they'd simply loose someone so contrary to the rigidness with which she knew the old men had followed their precious scenario.
Boy. That was a contradiction in and of itself. She had not met Nagisa in person, but she'd read his psych profile. What there was of it. This person was not the Angel of Free Will.
And not a fragment of a greater soul, the likes of Rei, either. He knew his emotions, accepted them, and generally did not balk at the puzzle that humanity was to an innocent soul.
He had an agenda, though. He'd flat out told her as much. Even if his insane tale was no more than an illusion, it was one he seemed to believe.
And when someone who could manifest power enough to crush a person where they stood told tall tales, it was wiser to consider them a visionary rather than a lunatic.
And then there was the carrot. Revenge felt ... sweet and bitter at the same time. A sickening kind of sweet, and a good kind of bitter.
Third Impact. It had been Gendo's goal all along. She'd seen the signs, seen the proof, actually contributed to some of the theory ... but she'd never actually looked and seen.
In the twilight days of the world, Ritsuko Akagi had looked. Ritsuko Akagi had seen. And Ritsuko Akagi had come to a startling conclusion.
She very much wanted to live.
And this insanity was the only option still remaining open.
She only hoped she'd placed her bet on the right madman this time around.
***
The wonders of maintenance crawlways. Especially when you have someone to distract what sensors are keeping tabs on the ones you need to traverse through. I'll openly admit it was Akagi that made this possible.
The place I was heading into was well isolated, and in the deepest reaches of Central Dogma. Well, maybe not as deep in there as Lilith had been, but close. The only way in led past sensor suites that could only be circumvented at risk, even with my newly acquired assistance, and past a door that couldn't be hacked because it wasn't part of the NERV information network. Sensors that had been linked to said network reported whether or not it had been tampered with, and whether or not the door remained closed ... but the reader was an autonomous and closed unit.
I couldn't get in that way, and the vents that led to the place were far too small to squeeze through.
There was another path, though. One you couldn't navigate without sonar and a diving apparatus, and the latter, of a size that would allow you to hold enough air in supply, would have been too bulky to allow you passage through some of the areas.
But I didn't really need to breathe anymore - Nagisa's prospective body came with an S^2 organ and while it still had a metabolism, said metabolism wasn't really necessary for survival. Oh, I had a brain, and when the metabolism worked the brain received its share of oxygen ... the biological processes that happened there, though, weren't what created my consciousness and defined my soul. If anything, it was the other way around.
But existential and metaphysical gibberish aside ...
I hauled myself from the outlet, pushing out into the lake of unoxygenated LCL that seemed to extend out into infinity ... the goop wasn't really all that transparent in this state, so that wasn't all too hard a thing to see accomplished.
Finally, I rose, kicking off with unclad feet, heading for the surface.
The reflexive gasp for air, even though I'd been without it for a fair bit of time now, was more reflex than anything else.
Still, with the place deserted as it was, it hadn't hurt anyone.
For a moment, I just floated there, hands spread out and treading LCL, as I took in the sight ...
... grotesque, was one of the words that came to mind. The giant stood, leaning, armor cracked where it was still present, huge bandages wrapped around the areas that were uncovered. Iron collars and 'pins' the size of railroad spikes had been used to fasten bits of organic matter harvested from Bardiel's ... Unit 03's ... remains onto the wounds.
Unit 00 looked for all the world like a demented fanboy's idea of the Frankenstein monster.
I hauled myself onto a catwalk, used a low intensity Field to scrape the LCL from my skin and clothes - I'd have preferred a wetsuit, or even a plugsuit, but I'd had to make do with boxers and a tee for this swim - as soon as I was in the clear. The stuff stunk to high heaven when dry.
I then removed the small watertight container I'd been lugging underneath the shirt, cracked it open, and retrieved the receiver/transmitter unit within. Placing the earpiece where it was meant to go, I clicked it on.
***
A sense of unease settled upon her, even as her eyes cracked open to stare, blankly, at the ceiling of the small apartment.
Contrary to common belief, Ayanami Rei did, in fact, possess emotions. She just didn't know how to deal with them, and ended up working around them instead. More often than not, anyway.
Sometimes, the emotions were simple enough to mostly ignore, other times less so ... this time, though, the disturbance was somehow more profound, and she suspected it was only in part due to the lack of obvious source thereof.
As the night went on, midnight rolling by, she remained awake, and slowly the sense of unease underwent a metamorphosis.
She was not aware how she knew this, but everything that she was told her some profound change had just taken place.
***
The chirping notifying her of an open comlink channel sounded loud in the otherwise quiet chamber. Other than the rapid click-clack of keys being pressed in rapid succession there hadn't been as much as a single sound.
In a way, this was good, since it meant she could give her full attention to the task at hand. Still, after even such a short while as she'd spent in solitary confinement, she felt herself missing someone she could talk to.
Not necessarily a person, even. A cat would have done just as well. A cat had done just as well on more than one occasion, actually. It was one of the reasons she was so fond of the little buggers.
Still, stuck as she was in the depths of Dogma, there really wasn't much opportunity to make conversation. Even one sided conversation.
Finally, the blonde scientist said, voice sharper than she'd intended it to be.
It wasn't exactly a walk in the park, came the retort. I'm there, though.
Instead of immediately responding, Ritsuko called up the command sequences she'd prepared for the occasion, verifying their validity one more time to be absolutely certain they were all that would be needed.
Then she spoke.
Everything is ready on this end. Whenever you're feeling comfortable enough ...?
Give me a mark, and I'll get to work, was the reply. She nodded to herself.
Five, four, three, two, one, Doctor Akagi counted down, finger hovering over the key that would confirm execution of the commands. Mark.
Click.
The fixes weren't as professional as they could have been, had she had access to more than merely the simple handheld terminal that was a part of technician kits throughout NERV, but they did their job well enough. The first few convinced the sensors connected to the MAGI and pointed at that particular Cage that nothing interesting was going on, slowly healing EVA aside. The others prevented a recording of the proceedings from being made.
And finally, the last one intercepted impulses sent out from hardwired nodes, to report the use of the Cage.
Now let's see if you're insane, or merely highly irrational, she said to herself, staring at the active threads of her programs running through their instructions.
***
I couldn't help but feel awed as I stood directly before the mauled behemoth, but the feeling quickly passed in favor of nervousness. Then, that was squashed, leaving me with a quiet in my mind that I knew would be necessary if I didn't want to mess up.
The theory I was running on was a longshot at best, irrational at worst, and would quite possibly lead to a result more severe than the unaltered sequence of events.
Which never really stopped me before.
The basis was that Impact's nature would be determined by its instigator. The ascension of humanity, or whatever you would name the ultimate result of the Third Impact presented in anime, was not the only possible outcome. For example, it was theorized that, were an Angel come into contact with Lilith, another Second Impact type phenomenon would result. Idle speculation, if you looked at it in one way, but something else entirely if you changed your point of view ...
At least, I was left with an impression of this sort.
But, to instigate and control Impact, EVA was needed. Or, at least, EVA was of great benefit.
Ikari had tried without it, and failed. While not necessarily due to the lack of an EVA at his beck and call, the one successfully documented Impact that showed more than a simple giant of light had required several Evangelion units.
Pushing my concerns momentarily aside, I focused.
I was far better at that since the D.D. Debacle. Possibly, it was the result of the same thing that had my physical shell regenerating rather than healing like a normal human body should. A carry-over from the nanites that I'd been using to repair myself back when I'd still been tall, dark and metallic.
Sight was pushed aside, as was hearing and touch, and I found myself floating, seemingly in suspended animation, in a vast sea of indistinct shadowy shapes.
Looking down, I found my self-image's hands to be more distinct than they'd been the previous few times I'd done this. Rather than outlines of humanoid limbs, contours lined with flashing paths of electric blue and aqua circuitry, it seemed they'd taken on the shape and form of my current shell. Meaning that I couldn't escape looking like Nagisa even here, which was mildly disconcerting.
The lines differed also. Rather than the previously present shades of blue, they were now a deep pulsating red ...
My self image apparently reflected the change in shell wholeheartedly.
Whether this meant I was adaptive, or merely weak-willed in that regard, I declined to pursue the answer to at the moment.
So not the time.
I 'pinged'. At least that was what I'd come to call it. The name had actually been accurate before, since the process had consisted of painting the surrounding area with a short low intensity burst of radiation and interpreting the reflections and refractions ... now, it was more like I was suddenly, for a brief instant, touching every single material surface in my line of sight.
The result was more than I'd expected, proving that while I'd thought somewhat ahead, I really should have put more consideration into this move and its possible slew of consequences. I just hoped the good Doctor could compensate from where she was, and keep the MAGI off me for a while longer.
Until we needed them to find what I was doing, at least.
If I lived that long.
***
Kuso! What did he do, set off an N^2 charge in there?
Agitated. That word seemed a bit weak to describe the current mental state of one Ritsuko Akagi. While she'd accounted for a multitude of possible reactions, and factored them into the camouflage she'd set up in the MAGI.
Cage Eight was secure. It was secluded, relatively speaking. There were very few possible paths you could take if you wanted to gain access. And right then, NERV trusted the MAGI with its security.
Still, the fact that the force that had been released within had almost managed to warp the support structure of the chamber was not something that could be casually dismissed.
Sensor readings from adjutant facilities raced along appropriate relays, prompting investigation ... this would have triggered an alarm as soon as it was registered by the MAGI, normally.
With the camouflage processes running, there was a slight delay.
A delay Akagi was using to divert those messages, diverting as many as she could from the MAGI and into various output ports which had been labeled dev/null as destination.
Unfortunately, she was still human. Brilliant, yes. Capable of outpacing impulses running along sensor relays with her impromptu coding? Not really.
A cold shiver went down her spine when the first batch of reports was accepted by the MAGI ...
... processed ...
... and ignored.
She blinked.
***
For my troubles, I was nailed in the face by a tank. At least, that's what it felt like. I should know, it's happened to me before.
Physical sensation immediately said goodbye, and I knew it wasn't only because something was pulling at the 'me' that was the representation of self.
Intellectually, I knew I could recover from ludicrous amounts of damage, if my Core remained intact. In practice ...
It was my own damn fault, really. I'd known Unit 00 was being stimulated to maintain a low intensity Field so that it could assimilate the biomass leftover from 03's remains.
I should have been more careful and taken possible Field resonance into account.
Where did this leave me?
With a brief flash of a glowing, cyclopean face as I rushed, headlong, towards it.
There was the oddest sensation, a moment of total nothingness, then ...
Contact.
***
And suddenly, the alarms were blaring.
Which made little sense, since, logically, they should have activated long before. Well, fifteen minutes, give or take a few. Which, to a computer of the MAGI's class, could just as well be considered a small eternity.
But then, judging from all the data streams she was watching, their flow being relayed to her handheld by various piggyback programs she'd sent into the network for just that purpose, this alert had not originated from within the MAGI.
Hardwired failsafes of some sort. That was the only explanation she could come up with, and also a very likely one.
And not one Ritsuko could do much about, with her current resources.
She herself was fairly secure, something she'd spent a bit of time making sure of prior. It wasn't all that difficult to increase the degree of lockout the area she and her so called employer had picked as their base of operations was under.
So Ritsuko kept an eye on NERV network activity, sent a few extra feelers into the security section's monitoring equipment, and waited.
***
I breathed.
After my face was something more recognizable than a pulp of mangled flesh pierced by shards of bone.
Moments like this made me feel very glad that I could block out pain almost entirely. I hadn't been so wrong in my prior assessment, since I regained possession of my body as it peeled itself from the indentation it had made when the EVA's AT Field threw it against the cage's wall.
If it hadn't been for the instinctive reaction of raising my own Field once I felt the 'ping's' effect upon Unit 00's, I would have been stuck with pulling together pulps of compressed biomass.
I'd have said 'not fun' at this point, but that would have been a monstrous understatement.
As things stood, I wouldn't have been able to do do that. Simply because I keeled over right after I had working legs I could stand on again.
My mind was a jumble of criss-crossing ideas, thoughts running rampant before I could rein them in. Sorting out that mess took a few moments. Minutes. Maybe a little under an hour. Or was it an instant?
I couldn't be sure, and right then I had more immediate worries.
I picked myself up, still light headed from extended contact with the EVA's Field, and tapped the miraculously still intact comlink.
How are we looking?
Static was my reply at first, then Ritsuko's voice came through, though jumbled and sounding as if she needed to work through interference. Not a good thing.
Better than FUBAR, the woman's tone was snide. But somewhat worse than 'Oh, hell'. You were louder than expected, and the MAGI have been going moderately crazy ever since.
Define moderately crazy, I queried, uneasily. That had not been part of the game-plan, hence the concern.
They're working on backup routines right now, but they're surprisingly clumsy, from where I'm looking, she retorted. Like they have to work a full restructurization of their decision making functions at the same time as doing everything else. It's ...
***
...erratic, sir. Maya Ibuki said, glancing up at the Commander and Vice-Commander of NERV. She wasn't exactly familiar with the moods of either man, but it was a testament to their agitation that she was able to tell they were even mildly unsettled.
Of course, she could tell most of this from the Vice-Commander. The Commander was not really a person whom you could read without either some form of ESP or an extensive knowledge of his personality, history, habits, and so on.
Maya was neither of those.
And she had a job to do, one which took a fair bit of concentration, so she couldn't exactly put her whole mind to the task.
Besides, there was something else. A little voice in the back of her mind, telling her to look closer at an unobtrusive seeming piece of code ...
***
Well, at least part of the goal had been accomplished.
And, gee, it only took setting the proverbial fire underneath NERV's collective asses to do it.
Not a good thing, by any stretch and definition, but not exactly unexpected.
Well, alright, I'd hoped to go in, do what I needed to quickly and quietly, and then get out. No mess, no fuss.
Funny how little things like, oh, reality seem hell-bent on ruining most plans people come up with, no?
Still, I could see, or perhaps feel would be a more apt description, the EVA beginning to heal at an accelerated rate.
Whether the other part of the attempt worked or not would have to be examined.
Collecting myself from off the walkway, sweeping what crimson stains there were around my point of impact with a brief flare of my Field, I proceeded towards the injured giant android. Biomech. Or whatever you wish to call it.
"Let's hope the retrieval mechanism is as idiot proof as Akagi said it'd be," I said to myself as I began to climb once I reached the farthest part of the walkway, the ladder brining me a few meters upwards and on level with where the Entry Plug of the Unit would be ejected for pilot extraction.
Not that I was planning on _pilot_ retrieval, to be honest.
I'd like to believe that it was some twisted bit of conscience that had motivated me to do this, but I knew better. That was merely a pleasant side effect. A bit of a bonus.
I was here to collect a necessary tool.
***
She woke to pain, running down her limbs and torso like wildfire, burning its way through them and throughout her body.
Eyes burned, teared, closed again to block the blinding light.
The chest contracted, expunging liquid of some sort from lungs and stomach.
Had she drowned?
It could have lasted a moment, it could have lasted hours, but finally the pain faded enough for coherent thoughts to be formed.
Not that this helped much.
Her memories were fractured, jumbled, split ...
A kaleidoscope of images and sounds running through her conscious mind ...
With distinct differences in perception occurring from a point, and continuing onwards.
A frown of concentration appeared on her face, as she focused on ...
... that ...
... single ...
... point ...
And died.
Or rather, relived her own death.
She fainted before she could scream.
***
"... two, one! Breach!"
The fastest way to get inside. Explosives went off. Precision shaped charges set to blow the door, allowing the Section Two security team entry.
Into a Cage holding a recovering EVA.
And no more than that.
***
'Alright, so they managed to get here quicker than I'd though they would,' I thought to myself as I was revisited by the rather unique, and somewhat cringe-inducing sensation of being suspended in LCL.
Not something I wanted to go back in.
Then there were the obvious bonuses of the situation. One of them being that the grunts wouldn't find us.
Yes, this was the Plug. No, this wasn't the pilot's space. How considerate of Gendo to give his Dummy Plugs their own little cubbyholes in there.
It was a bit of a tight fit, though ... and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't enjoying being pressed against the naked body of the former sole occupant of this space.
If it weren't for the impending end of the world and the homicidal goons outside, this would have been downright cozy.
What made the situation a little less pleasant was the fact that the occupant of the body laying beside me was, if things had gone the way I think they had, more than slightly unstable.
It isn't every day that your soul gets split in two after you commit suicide after all.
I just hoped Akagi senior wouldn't be able to puree me quite yet. Truth be told, I was more than a little nervous about that.
Necessity and all, but I doubted she'd take kindly to having been put inside an Ayanami clone body.
Yeah.
Right.
Keep telling yourself that, G-kun. Keep telling yourself that.
***
end two
***
AN: snowball, snowball, rolling 'round and 'round ... *hangs head* done. Yay. One more.
If you think I'm not focusing on the pilots enough, you're right. If you're thinking I'm a lecher for putting my avvie into a confined, wet space with a Rei clone, you're doubly right.
In the next part: Resolutions! Reprehensions! A Maya scene(she's cute. I like her. deal.)! Psycho-sensei Akagi! EVA combat! Battle-programmer Akagi!
Join us as it all goes to hell in a handbasket!
Incarna part three: We were teenaged dummy plugs, too!
Teaser available in placeholder thread.
-Griever
When tact is required, use brute force. When force is required, use greater force.
When the greatest force is required, use your head. Surprise is everything. - The Book of Cataclysm

I mentioned this short Doki Doki Productions video in General/General, but thought I'd go into a little more detail here...
It's a parody of Apple's "Switch" ad campaign, promoting subtitled anime. What makes it really good, though, is the audio track - if that wasn't the original dub actress providing the monologue, it's a very close imitation.
It's a very small download - go get it, then tell me whether I'm off-base...
-Rob Kelk
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

Okay, no, I'm not seriously suggesting it as a Step, though it might work as a Stagger. But either way, it would be awfully... cathartic... to see Doug play cleanup to the GG universe.
GG is... unusual. It's as if someone took the classical anime trope "cute little girls who are actually cyborg assassins" and ripped out every bit of lollicon and damnear every iota of cuteness, and ended up taking a seriously 'realistic' look at how such a story might *really* play out... and it isn't pretty. In one scene, three adorable young girls sit around a table having tea, calmly discussing their brainwashing and whether it needs to be adjusted, while one keeps spooning loads of sugar into her tea because her sense of taste is deteriorating. Each girl is partnered with a "big brother," a handler whose job it is to manage his cyborg assassin, and is the target of her carefully installed fixation. The handlers run the gamut from kill-him-now abusers to guys who wander through the series with haunted expressions, obviously wondering how the hell they became party to this monstrosity, and yet unable to abandon their charges (Marco and Angela are particularly heartwrenching). And the support staff span the same spectrum, with some characters who manage to be very memorable on very little screen time.
Having Doug, or someone similar, drop in post-series and stumble over the truth of the Social Welfare Agency, when the first-gen girls are approaching the end of their shortened lifetimes, would... well, I'm a sucker for poetic justice and happy endings. Probably why I like fanfic. Of course, there's a good chance Doug couldn't *do* anything with this situation, given it's such a tangle, and the opportunities for him to make things *worse* by overreacting... ouch.
And yet... I can't stop *wanting* it, wanting *something,* for these poor girls. GG got dismissed by a lot of people when it came out, but for me, it was a real yanker on the heartstrings. I guess I just can't let it go.

How about Surfin' Bird by the Trashmen?
Would that be completely useless to Doug or what?
Pa-pa-pa ooh mao-mao
Pa-pa ooh mao mao
Pa-pa-pa ooh mao-mao
Pa-pa ooh mao mao
Well don't you know about the bird?
Everybody knows that the bird is the word!
Pa-pa-pa ooh mao-mao
Pa-pa ooh mao mao
Pa-pa-pa ooh mao-mao
Pa-pa ooh mao mao
etc.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll

I am in strong support for a firefly step. The crew of the Serenity would be a wonderful backstop for Doug, and in a combat situation, he'd freak the hell out of Jayne.
Comedy would be if he recognized Jayne and perhaps Zoe from an Angel step. Sick, sad comedy.. but comedy.Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979

you mean he's METAHUMANLY intelligent?
how's that different from humanly intelligent?
-murmur

I blinked. "They're complete idiots, aren't they?" I muttered under my breath to Chris."How'd you guess?" he whispered back."Metahuman levels of perception and intelligence," I replied. "They *do* come in handy once in a while.""You don't say."

-- Bob
---------
It's spelt "Frodo Baggins" but it's pronounced "Throat-wobbler Mangrove."

We've had a discussion on it before, and one of the ideas is that Doug becomes Sagara's "minder" (after begged by the principal and school staff...on their hands and knees) in order to keep the damage to school property down..at least down to an acceptable level.
I had read up to volume 7 of Full Metal Panic manga and volume 2 of Full Metal Panic Bomb!. Given the daily amount of property damage that either occurrs around or is caused by Sagara, I think the idea has merit.
If you look at Sagara as a military "wild child", then all his actions make sense. What I don't understand is why Mithril gave him the job of guarding Chidori w/o giving him backup/a minder. Given his serious nature, he's compelled to watch her 24/7 without a break. I know this to be the case, there was a chapter where Chidori could not remember what she did during certain hours of the night and Sagara gave her an hour by hour detailed log of her actions during that nite. Now, if he knows that there's someone backstopping him (one that he trusts), he might just be persuaded that there is no harm in going to standyby mode, once in a while.(maybe Doug can persuade him by telling him to think of it as a maintenance cycle).
It would be interesting to see how Sagara classify Doug initially and over time. Sagara will see Doug sooner or later as out of the ordinary, but whether he's friend or foe is the question. It would be interesting if he breaks into Doug's apartment and finds his helmet (with the U.N. insignia). It will probably cause a lot of running around by various agents figuring out from what alphabet Doug's working for.
It really would be interesting when he accepts Doug as a fellow comrade-in-arms (like Kurtz Weber or Melissa Mao).
Eventually, someone (Mithril or perhaps some organization or even Gauron hmself) would target Doug. Heh. It'll probably like fishing for a guppy and pulling in a great white.
Hah..found a link to Full Metal Panic sigma:
www.boku-tachi.net/
Have fun!
Edit2: I've gone thru reading the first 2 chapters of FMP:Sigma
There is an agent called "Wraith" who is supposed to be watching over Chidori when Sagara goes on his missions and has leave Chidori unguarded. Given the compartmentalization between the Operations and Intelligence branches of Mithril, what if the Operations branch thought that Doug was Wraith? What if Sagara thought he was Wraith?
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

Don't Let the Rain Come Down (Crooked Little Man)

CHORUS
(Ah, ah) Oh, no, don't let the rain come down
(Ah, ah) Oh, no, don't let the rain come down
(Ah, ah) Oh, no, don't let the rain come down
My roof's got a hole in it and I might drown
Oh, yes, my roof's got a hole in it and I might drown
There was a crooked man and he had a crooked smile
Had a crooked sixpence and he walked a crooked mile
Had a crooked cat and he had a crooked mouse
They all lived together in a crooked little house

CHORUS
Well, this crooked little man and his crooked little smile
Took his crooked sixpence and he walked a crooked mile
Bought some crooked nails and a crooked little bat
Tried to fix his roof with a rat-tat-tat-tat-tat
CHORUS
Now this crooked little man and his crooked cat and mouse
They all live together in a crooked little house
Has a crooked door with a crooked little latch
Has a crooked roof with a crooked little patch
CHORUS
CHORUS
(Ah, ah) Oh, no, don't let the rain come down
(Ah, ah) Oh, no, don't let the rain come down
(Ah, ah) Oh, no, don't let the rain come down
My roof's got a hole in it (my roof's got a hole in it)
My roof's got a hole in it and I might drown
_________________________________________________
Beans in My Ears

My mommy said not to put beans in my ears
Beans in my ears, beans in my ears
My mommy said not to put beans in my ears
Beans in my ears
Now why would I want to put beans in my ears
Beans in my ears, beans in my ears
Now why would I want to put beans in my ears
Beans in my ears
You can't hear the teacher with beans in your ears,
Beans in your ears, beans in your ears
You can't hear the teacher with beans in your ears,
Beans in your ears

What's that you say, let's put beans in our ears
Beans in our ears, beans in our ears
What's that you say, let's put beans in our ears
Beans in our ears
You'll have to speak up I got beans in my ears
Beans in my ears, beans in my ears
You'll have to speak up I got beans in my ears
Beans in her ears
Say mommy we've gone and put beans in our ears
Beans in our ears, beans in our ears
Say mommy we've gone and put beans in our ears
Beans in our ears
That's nice boys just don't put those beans in your ears
Beans in our ears, beans in our ears
That's nice boys just don't put those beans in your ears
Beans in our ears
I think that all grown ups have beans in their ears
Beans in their ears, beans in their ears
I think that all grown ups have beans in their ears
Beans in their ears
__________________________________________________
The first first lyrics from Freedom's Star
I'm gonna tye to tie my hope to Freedom's Star
I'm gonna spread the word both near and far
And tall young man hold your head up high
The gift of freedom you cannot buy
Hold tight to oh my brother. To Freedom's Star
MP3.com has the three of them here:
www.mp3.com/albums/290864/summary.html

I'm not sure what Doug could get out of some of theese songs.
Amazon has a few soundclips up of the songs:
www.amazon.com/exec/obido...c&n=507846
--------------------
Tom Mathews aka Disruptor

TEENAGE GENIN NINJA HEROES
chapter 2
Five Beginnings, a Departure, and a Memory

JUNE, TWELFTH YEAR AFTER THE ATTACK OF THE KYUUBI
"REEEOOOOOOOOWW!"
"Itai! Itai! Hold -still-, you idiot cat!" Naruto howled, nearly as loudly as his prisoner.
"Don't hold it so roughly!" Sakura scolded. "It won't stop -fighting- while you're crushing its ribs!"
Sasuke counted his way down the checklist. "Ginger tabby, bow on left ear, tomcat, approximately seventeen pounds. This looks like our target." [And,] he carefully did not say, [our fifth perfect mission.]
"Yep," their Sensei, Neshan, confirmed. "This is Tora, all right. Take a good look; you'll be getting to know him -real- well."
"He runs away a lot?" Sakura guessed, holding one hand firmly on the back of the cat's neck while supporting his weight by the other arm. {Who'd want him -back-?} her second personality remarked from the security of her subconcious, with a figurative glare at the way the feline was digging his claws into her arm.
Naruto had been nursing the scratches on his face and bite on his hand after being relieved of his infuriated burden, but now he looked up and grinned. "Ano sa, ano sa, does that mean we get a real mission now?"
Neshan felt free to smirk, since he was turned away from the Genin and it couldn't be seen. "By rights, that question should disqualify you..."
"Ehh? No, wait, I understand! Really! We need to-"
"Understand the importance of details in even the most power-intensive fight." His voice, deliberately stern, wavered on the last word.
Naruto didn't notice. "But, Seeeeennnseeeeeiiii!"
The Jounin laughed. "Oh, don't worry. I'm just winding you up. Once we get Tigger here back to Madame Shijimi, you three can knock off 'till noon. Meet me at the usual field; I'll talk to the Third about having a mission for you tomorrow." None of the students bothered to wonder who or what a 'tigger' was. Their sensei was an immigrant to Konoha, and even after spending most of his life there, was still prone to making allusions to the tales and culture of his homeland - regardless of the fact that no one around him had any clue what he was talking about. Eventually, like gnats or mosquitos, it had simply become something to be accepted.
"YAAHOOOO!" Konoha's Loudest Ninja lived up to his nickname.
* * * * *
"Well, I'll be damned."
Sakura was dancing across the center of the turbulent pool under the small waterfall, running through the fifth of the eight academy taijutsu kata at half speed. Despite her movement and shifting weight, and the instability of the surface underneath her, her feet left not even a ripple to mark their passing.
Sasuke was climbing a tree on the opposite bank, walking slowly up with never a wobble or a missed step. Already he was halfway up with nary a scar on the bark, and from the scuffing of the dirt at the tree's base he'd been at it a while.
Naruto was sitting in the grass at the top of the small cliff, with three different, -large- scrolls spread out before him. Neshan recognized the end-caps on the nearest one - the tactical manual he had given to his student.
"Oi, you," came a voice from behind him. "These the super gifted kids you said'd be handling Gatou's thugs?"
"Just so, Tazuna-san. YO! MINIONS!"
*splishthumpwhap...flutterflutter... bumpbumpbump* At their teacher's shout, all three Genin had abandoned what they were doing and crossed the distance to land if front of him in a single leap.
"Sensei, who's this?" Sakura asked, peering up at the balding, slovenly man in front of her. {Eeeew... if he starts -scratching-, I'll hurl!}
Neshan didn't answer immediately, instead turning to their guest and gesturing towards his students in turn. "Umida-san, these are my students - Haruno Sakura, Uzumaki Naruto, and Uchiha Sasuke. Kids, this is our client for a C-class bodyguard mission to the Wave Country. His name is Umida Tazuna."
"Yosh!" Naruto cheered, giving a thumbs up. "Don't you worry about a thing, Pops! Nobody's gonna touch you while -I'm- around!"
"Hmph. I oughta go back and ask for a team without a super loudmouthed idiot on it."
"What?! Hey, you! Don't you think tha-MPH!" Sakura grabbed him into a one-armed headlock and clapped the other hand firmly over her teammate's mouth. Even without accounting for his crush on her, Naruto knew that - with the taijutsu training she'd been doing since graduation - he had no chance of winning a grappling match unless she -let- him do so. He crossed his arms and subsided in bad grace.
Neshan smiled benignly over the scene. "Considering your failure to provide accurate information, I think that we're actually being quite generous."
Sasuke cocked an eyebrow, and Sakura let her hand fall away from Naruto's face as both of them stared on with identical expressions of shock.
Tazuna froze, for a moment, then slumped defeatedly. "You know...?"
"Quite a bit more than you, I think. But, under the circumstances, your credit is good, and the interest on the balance of your payment quite reasonable."
The architecht closed his eyes and sighed. "Heh. Well, I guess that's the best I could hope for in this super-bad situation."
"Right, so. If you're amenable to departing in, say, two hours, then we can let the kids get home and pack, right?"
"Two hours, right." And he turned and walked away, head, for once, held high.
"Sensei..." Sakura said, standing away from her shorter compatriot. "What you said... this is a -B-CLASS- mission?!" {Damn it! Is he trying to -kill- us?!}
He nodded, slowly. "Almost certainly. However... As a Special Jounin, I am prohibited from spending extended periods of time away from the village. This will be the only high-level mission I'll be able to take with you. This will be my -only- opportunity to... show you what I want to teach you. The greater dangers... I believe that they'll help to teach you more than you'd otherwise be able to learn." He adjusted his glasses and looked at them seriously. "And your performance in your training has been beyond my wildest expectations. In terms of pure combat ability... all three of you are already Chuunin level."
"But not in other ways," Naruto said, dissapointed.
Neshan laid a hand on his shoulder. "You've all three of you got some growing up to do. You -could- do it right away, if you had to - but there's no reason you should. You're better off waiting - it'll be healthier in the long run."
"I'm not a child," he snarled.
"If you need to say that - you are. For now." He tapped Naruto on the side of the chin, forcing the smaller boy to meet his gaze directly. "Don't be in such a hurry. Most of the time, adulthood sucks. You work, you worry, you suffer... For every restriction you lose from outside, you gain three more inside your head. The more careful you are about this - the more groundwork you lay now - the smaller the real price you'll have to pay later."
"Price?" Sakura asked, hovering uncertainly on the edges of their conversation.
"Everything has a cost, kid. Maturity's is paid in pain. Now go on. Clock's running."
* * * * *
"MOOOOOM!" Sakura yelled, head buried in her closet.
"What!" came the muffled reply from downstairs.
"WHERE'S MY FIRE KIT?"
"You used it! Replacement's with the groceries!"
"THANKS!"
Fire kit, rations, weapons, medical kit, bandages, more weapons, drug kit, toiletries...
"Aaaaannd a change of clothes!" she said triumphantly, pulling something from amid the shoulder-high mountain of cloth and letting it unfurl to reveal...
A bright green leotard. "Ugh. Not that."
A bra - one of her mother's, which must've gotten mixed in with her laundry. No telling how long ago, given -her- room. "Not yet, dammit."
A bikini top with noticably less fabric than the previous item. *blush* "Um, no."
Her best friend snickered. "Not until it's too small for you, anyway."
"Bite me, Ino-buta." It was so -nice- to be friends with Ino again! Granted, she'd have been just as glad to be spared Anko-sensei's chosen means of forcing them to make up - she -still- couldn't get the sulfer stink out of what -had- been her favorite pair of sandals - but if that was the only thing she lost getting her sister-in-arms back, then she'd count it as cheap at twice the price.
"Why are you even bothering, anyway, Odeko-chan? You know you'll just end up taking another of those tacky red dresses." To hear Ino tell -her- version of the leadup to that entirely-too-memorable night, involving the obnoxious Special Jounin in the conspiracy to rescue their friendship actually -hadn't- been Neshan-sensei's idea... which was kind of startling when you considered that he was basically the psycho-woman's best friend.
"They are -not- tacky!" She whirled, hands going to her hips, then tossed her head, flipping her braid back over her shoulder. "Besides, I lost my last clean one."
The third person in the room decided to calm things down before the other two started one of their fights - again. "How on earth do you find -anything- in here, anyway?" Tenten asked. -That- friendship, though, -was- her teacher's fault. He had taken her to a man he had called 'the Leaf's greatest Taijutsu specialist' to learn what he had described as the perfected variant of the basic hand-to-hand forms that she - along with all the other students in her year - had been taught in the academy.
Whatever she had been expecting, a thirty year old man with a spandex fetish and eyebrows that could have doubled for bottle-brushes was -not- it. That would have been enough of a dissapointment, but the apparition had gone on to cement the impression of complete and pathetic insanity by introducing himself as 'That Friend of Youth and educator of fertile young minds, Konoha's Beautiful Green Beast - Maitooooooo GAI!'
Despite his talk of being an educator, though, it had taken Tenten's intervention - spurred by Neshan's offer to teach her the deceptively subtle jutsu he used to give his thrown weapons such force of impact - to convince Gai to polish Sakura's taijutsu techniques.
Tenten had looked at the kunai Neshan had buried most of its own length into the living wood of the large tree at the center of the clearing where Team Gai had been practicing, then walked, head bowed, over to stand in front of her instructor. When she looked up, unshed tears had glimmered across the corners of her eyes. 'If you say no,' she had said, voice trembling, 'I'll cry.'
Gai had refused at first, saying that 'The splendor of her shining youth would be smirched were I to interfere so with her education! By forging its -own- path to greatness, her star will shine far brighter!'
Tenten had sniffled.
That had been enough - almost - to drop the eccentric Jounin into a panic. 'Tenten! Be strong! The glittering shine of-'
- the single tear breaking free and rolling down Tenten's cheek. Gai had agreed to the bargain with an apologetic howl, and no one present had really regretted it. In the end, the two girls had even accounted the greatest benefit as being, not the improvments to their skills, but their new friend.
Sakura crossed her arms, bikini still dangling from one hand. "It's not as disorganized as it looks," she sniffed.
"No," Ino wisecracked. "It's worse."
Tenten snickered. "That's possible?"
The pink-haired girl fumed for a moment, then dropped the bikini, grabbed the nearest throwable object... and ducked, eyes going wide. *fwipTHWAK* "Eep!"
The oldest girl froze in place, staring at the object her kunai had impaled against the corkboard over the desk. Sakura turned to look at it, then stared also.
"BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" Ino fell over laughing as Sakura blushed and started frantically trying to pry the kunai out and close the book - or at least turn it to a less embarrassing - and less dog-eared - page.
Tenten sat there in horror for a moment longer, then tried to apologize - tried, since the effort kept getting tangled up with the twin urges to laugh at the sheer absurdity of the situation and lock up in tongue-tied mortification at exactly -which- of that notorious book's pages had been showing. In the end, she did none of them. "Ano... -Icha Icha Paradise-?!"
*pop!* Sakura finally pulled the blade free - it had gone straight through, all the way into the wall. "you'd think i'd know better than to throw things at you by now... Rrg. My brother's a jerk."
"That wasn't a page a -guy- would turn to, Odeko-chaaaAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" Ino smirked at the opportunity to deliver a well-deserved zinger onto her best friend, but the other girl's squinting glare had been the final straw needed to shatter her hard-won control and send her spiraling back into helpless laughter.
"Grrrr." Sakura took a short step over the tangled pile of knitting supplies wrapped halfway around the desk chair's back leg, then a long one over the shallow mound of dirty clothes on top of her favorite Go board, then a second short one to balance on top of the heavy staff braced over her stereo and three different piles of scolls by the base of her bed and the surface of the desk. Both of the other girls had been sitting on the bed, since it was by far the largest clear space in the room, and Tenten casually reached out a leg and tripped the younger kunoichi before she could lock her hands around her helpless best friend's throat.
"Ne, ne, Sakura? You can drop by my house on your way out of town and borrow one of my outfits - you really don't have much more time to look, you know."
"Really?" she said, voice badly muffled by the mattress.
"Really-really," Tenten confirmed with a smile.
* * * * *
As passers-by went, he was as unremarkable as they came. Average height, average build, brown eyes and shortish hair-colored hair. Respectably but not flashily dressed, his age was in that indeterminate zone between the late twenties and the early forties, and he moved down the street with the determined stride of a definite Type A traveller.
A slightly drunken gaggle of giggling kawaii passed him on the other side of the street, going the opposite direction. The words 'Uchiha' and 'whipped cream' could be heard drifting up faintly out of the center of the cluster of a dozen or so girls.
The anonymous man shuddered slightly.
Conventional wisdom said that most kunoichi were best suited to act as Genjutsu specialists, and that most Genjutsu users were likewise female. The precise reasoning behind this conclusion varied, of course, but generally ran to the effect of the aptitude being a result - or cause - of female ninjas' more deceptive, manipulative natures. As opposed to the agressive, combative nature of their male counterparts, of course.
The kindest thing Neshan-sensei had had to say about that line of thought was 'Bunk!'
And the development of Team Seven seemed to have borne his thought out. Naruto's tactics had gone from childishly simple to -deceptively- simple, and were well backed by a growing array of quick-acting but power-intensive ninjutsu. Even the short month since the formation of their team had given Sakura the time to begin to explore the wealth of strategies opened up by ever-increasing taijutsu skills... and the exceptional strength and speed that had led to their creation.
And Sasuke - posessing both an observant and detail-oriented mind and the deep chakra reserves neccessary to shape the truly dangerous high-level genjutsu - was well on his way to trading in his title to become Konoha's Number One -Genin-.
The anonymous man smiled, and hitched his pack higher on his shoulder.
He had to meet his team.
* * * * *
Nightcap, pajamas.
The Gatou syndicate was primarily a trading concern. It moved about a quarter of the cargo moving across the Mist Sea, and 98% of that going to the Wave Country.
Kunai, shuriken, Fuuma Shuriken.
Since the Whitefish Guild had gone out of business - leaving Gatou with its current monopoly - the Gross National Product of the Wave Country had dropped by more than a third. Most of Gatou's profits from its control of the Wave trade stemmed from its ability to offer lower wages in the now-destitute Wave than it would in more affluent nations. By locating the majority of its construction and refit yards in the Wave Country, the Gatou Group could cut its operating expenses considerably.
Ramen, firestarter.
While the Wave Country was made up of a large number of individual islands, the straits between them were narrow enough to be easily crossed by ferry - even the broadest would take only an hour or two. In contrast, the trip from the islands to the mainland required most of a day.
First aid kit, canteen.
When it was finished, the causeway currently under construction would be the largest bridge of any type anywhere in the world. More relevantly, it would allow anyone with a cart or a motor-truck access to the Wave, not only reversing the depression brought on by the Gatou Group's high freight rates but probably as much as doubling the Wave's GNP.
Spare jacket, more ramen.
With that much of an improvement in local industry, wages would rise - massively. The Wave's exports of exotic woods and marine delicacies would drive the economy until its standard of living became one of the highest in the world. The Gatou Group's profit margin, when deprived of cheap labor in the Wave Country, would take a massive hit - a fifty percent reduction at the very least, probably more.
Toothbrush, toothpaste.
The head of the Gatou Group, a man by the same name, was known for being both agressive and utterly ruthless. He had no respect for the laws of the countries in which he operated, much less anything as empherial as 'morals'. With the wealth of his company available for the purpose, it was well within both his means and his character to hire legal ninja or missing-nins to assassinate the driving force behind the construction of the mainland bridge - Umida Tazuna.
Bedroll, Gama-chan.
At some point in the future, he would definitely be asked to take missions of equal or higher rating - B, A, or even S class missions so dangerous that they were given only to volunteers - but even if he did, he would never again have to do so with so little preperation. When that day came, his skills would be far in advance of those he currently posessed, and his ability to meet the challenges of those missions likewise improved.
This combination of danger and weakness would not, -could- not be repeated - his life would never be more at risk than it was now.
"Yosh!" Naruto declared, tying the straps of his backpack closed. "I'll make you proud, Sensei!" And, with a bang and a flourish, he closed and locked his apartment's door behind him, then turned and started off towards the village's gate.
"N-Naruto-kun?"
"Eh?" He turned and looked down slightly. A girl, about his age, dark blue hair, pure white eyes - not blank like if she was blind, but -white-, iris and pupil both. The bulky fur-edged jacket and faint blush tickled at his memory. "Ahhh... Hinata-chan, right?"
She jerked, slightly, as though struck lightly. "H-hai! Hyuuga Hinata."
Was she afraid he'd hurt her? "Right, I remember! From the Academy! You were right after Sasuke in Taijutsu!"
She smiled, slightly, and the blush got noticeably deeped. "H-hai. A-a-ano... I was wondering..." she trailed off and started to nibble at the first knuckle of her right hand.
Huh? "Ne, ne, wondering what?" he prompted.
"I was w-wondering if... if you'd..." She swallowed hard and took a deep breath, then bowed her head and blurted, "ifyoudliketoeatlunchwithme!" Then she froze, and her face was the color of a beet as she bit her bottom lip unconciously.
She... wanted to eat lunch... with -him-? That meant... that meant...
That meant she wanted to be friends!
He put a hand behind his head and laughed sheepishly. Now of all times! "Eheheh... Sorry, Hinata-chan, but I can't." She slumped visibly. "Demo, demo! When I get back from my mission I can take you to Ichiraku!"
Her face positively -lit- up, and he could have sworn he saw the wilted blooms in Mrs. Yamada's flowerbox perk up and start to glow with health. [Wow,] he realized. [Hinata-chan's actually kind of pretty.]
"Hai!" She bowed, abruptly. "It's a da- a deal!"
He grinned and waved over his shoulder as he bolted off. "Great! See ya then!"
Hyuuga Hinata smiled softly as she watched her crush rush off towards Konohagakure's main gate. [Naruto-kun... kakkoi...]
"So? Wha'd I tell ya?"
The shy Genin jumped slightly, and turned to face the one who had addressed her. -Why- did she insist on popping out of nowhere like that? "H-hai, Anko-sensei. He... I..." She lunged forward and latched on to the older woman with a fierce hug. "Thank you!"
Anko rocked back on her heels from the impact, and stared down a the blue-tinged head of hair buried against her chest for a moment. Then she smiled, more softly than anyone save her closest friends would have given her credit for, and wrapped her arms gently around her student's shoulders. "You're welcome." After a moment, she tugged at Hinata's shoulders and held her at arm's length. "So! With that done, all that's left for today is to get you set up for tomorrow's mission!"
"N-no." Hinata shook her head sharply. "I-I need to talk to... before my courage runs out. Please, Sensei, where does Team Eight train?"
[This is too fast. When he rejects her, we'll have lost everything we've made so far.] But how to dissuade her without doing the damage herself? Maybe if she-
"I know that you don't think it's a good idea to... to do this this soon," the girl interrupted her thoughts. "Demo... If I go any farther thinking that... that he really thinks of himself as my cousin... and I'm -wrong-, then... It'll all be undermined when I find out. Better... better to know now, and only have to, to build myself once." She gave a shy little smile. "Besides, I'm used... to cold family."
[I see,] Anko closed her eyes and shook her head. [I underestimated her.] "The place you want is a small clearing, about half a mile behind Field Two. Look for the big oak."
Hinata bowed again. "Arigatou!"
* * * * *
*shKRAK* Hit. *shKRAK* Hit. *shKRAK* Miss.
Yamanaka Ino curled the whip back up into a single coil with a deft twist of the wrist and gave a huff of irritation as she glared at the last of the small clay bottles sitting on the irregularly spaced bamboo poles in the center of the clearing. "Sensei," she said, "Why do I have to use -this- silly thing-" She brandished the whip at him. "-rather than a real weapon?"
"Coming from the person you want to be, it is silly," Morino Ibiki agreed, with a smile that tugged oddly at the slashing scar running across his face. "Coming from the person you -are-, though, it'll fit exactly with what your opponents expect... and exactly what they're afraid of."
She blushed. "But, that's..."
"Feh. Just give it up. Your princess act is so troublesome - especially when it doesn't work." Nara Shikamaru had already run through his chakra reserves with their earlier group training, and Ibiki had let him take an hour or so to recover before starting on his taijutsu. He lay flat on his back, staring at the cloudy sky overhead, and didn't even turn his head to look at his teammate as he spoke.
"Shi. Ka. Ma. Ruuuu..." Ino snarled as she turned to loom over him. "Maybe -you- think that-"
"Enough," Ibiki broke in. "Ino. Shikamaru. A ninja can't afford self deception, and he can't afford to alienate his teammates." He turned his head slightly, adressing Shikamaru. "Break's over. Go help Chouji with his tree-climbing. Ino, leave the whip for now and switch to the needles."
Both Genin growled and went to obey, and Ibiki took a moment to rub at the scar where his headache was concentrating most. [Yare, yare. What a team. None of the three of them are that bad alone, but put them together and... What did I do to deserve this?] He paused a moment, reviewing the last month of his professional life. [Don't answer that.]
"Oi, Chouji," Shikamaru was saying as he walked over to the pair. "If you can't move the patch quick enough, try wrapping it all the way around, so that a part of it is -always- gripping without your having to move it."
"Demo, Shikamaru, that means I'd have to hold two different jutsu at the same time," the bulky Genin objected.
"Yes," Ibiki said, interrupting, "but you'd have to learn that before you'd be ready to try for Chuunin anyway. Now's a very good time to start."
"Hmph. Alright. But this new barbeque place had better be worth it!"
The Jounin chuckled. "I've heard nothing but good things. Shikamaru, come on."
"Hai, hai..."
* * * * *
'Dear Mrs. Chin... I regret to inform you that following the full investigation of the incident detailed in my last letter to you, y-' There was a slight flicker as the letter was snatched out from in front of him.
"What'cha doin'?"
Umuino Iruka looked up, then sighed. Devilish grin, tan trenchcoat thrown over the visitor's chair behind her, net shirt, -very- nice breasts... He jerked his gaze to the side. [I wish she wouldn't -lean forwards- like that.] "Ohayo, Anko-sama."
She leaned back slightly, turning to put her perch on the edge of his desk into a more natural posture (and, to his heart rate's consternation, putting her figure above the waist into a perfect profile) and squinted at the sheet of paper in her hand. "Chin, huh? What, ya tossing him out? Nothing's wrong with the kid."
He made a futile grab for the letter. "No, not really. But with the evidence I have, I can't punish the one really responsible. I've put in a reccomendation that Hokage-sama sponsor him for re-admission, but I don't have the authority to do anything else."
She jerked it out of his reach, then sniffed and tossed it on his blotter. "Yer taking these rules too seriously. I mean, what's more important - some ink on a page somewhere or a kid losin' his dream?"
"The child, of course." He sighed and smoothed out the new wrinkles in the letter as she started to rummage through the pile of graded papers sitting to one side. "But there's other things involved, too. These same rules prevent a student from being unfairly dismissed if he offends a teacher, or another one being improperly protected after misbehavior. The fact that this time they're being abused doesn't negate that net value, or make the confidence it gives the students' parents any less vital."
She snorted and started to fold one of the reports, origami style. "A rule ain't a law, and this's why: if it gets in the way of the right thing, then it -should- be ignored. I've had both'a these kids into my office - there's no good that can come of letting some sneering little bully hide behind the letter of the law."
"If he's smart enough to do it, then I can't dismiss him," Iruka said, and his face was very cold. "I -shouldn't- dismiss him. This academy isn't here to raise good people. It's here to -train- -ninja-, and that kind of cunning is a trait that very much suits one."
There was a long, tense silence, and she set the completed paper snake on top of the stack of reports and gave him the oddest look, like equal parts shock, horror, and awe, all mixed in with a little bit of fear. When she spoke, her voice was quiet and subdued, and she did not meet his eyes. "You're right. It's just that..."
He sighed, and nodded. "They're just kids." A beat. "Anyway, was there something you needed?"
Anko shook off the funk and smiled, warmly for once, rather than edged and manic like usual. "Team Eight's doing well."
"Oh?" He perked up and leaned forward. "Tell me?"
* * * * *
"Tazuna-san, please," Neshan said as they walked side by side through downtown Konohagakure. "Our ability to help you is in direct proportion to your willingness to cooperate with us."
The slovenly architect snorted. "I'm willing. I just don't see why you'd need me to go over all this since you know everything already."
The Jounin hitched his pack up higher on his shoulder and shook his head. "We know -some-, and can guess more from that, but any new information is useful, even if all it is is the fact that two different sources agree on a given point."
"Huh." Tazuna scowled for a moment, then looked over. "I don't know if he's hired any regular ninja. If he has, he does most of his business in the Water Country, so they'll probably be from there."
Neshan nodded.
"I think he's got about four or five missing-nin on the payroll. I've only ever seen two, but rumors give consistent descriptions of three more. There're four men from the Mist, and one woman from the Leaf. Two of the men always work together; those're the ones I saw. Black hair, in their twenties, wear these heavy clawed gauntlets. The other two men are supposed together - I think one works for the other - but sometimes show up alone. One's a kid, black hair, long, wears a mask. Younger than you, older than your students. Other's a man, maybe thirty. Bandaged face, tall, carries a huge, cleaver-sword thing about as long as he is." He took a deep breath. "They're supposed to be dangerous - super ruthless - but the woman is worse. Short-to-average, super skinny, wierd colored hair, lots of scars, and eyes that don't match each other or look like anything human. If she's killed half the people she's supposed to've, in a quarter the ways, and if they're only an eighth as bad as they're supposed to be, then she's a super horrible blood-drinking monster worse than anything you ever saw in a history book or head in a legend."
"You believe it," the younger man said quietly.
"I had a friend that said he'd seen her - super reliable man, never told a lie in his life. He said every word of the rumors was true, and I've never once seem a man look so super scared." He gave his escort a sidelong glance. "You sure you can help?"
"My kids can do this," the other said firmly, repeating the statement softly under his breath as they came to the gate.
"My kids can do this."
As they came to a halt, Neshan nodded to himself and looked his students over. Sakura was standing on the balls of her feet with her fingers interlaced behind her, rocking back and forth slightly as they waited for Naruto. She was dressed much as she usually was these days - short, sleeveless burgandy dress with the Haruno clan crest on the back, tight, stretchy shorts underneath for modesty, sandals, and white linen bandages wound tightly around fingers, palms, wrists and forearms to provide an additional measure of bracing during punches and blocks. She had followed his example and braided her hair to keep it out of the way, and had let the loose plait tuck itself under her backpack as she glanced around with a happy smile. Alert, eager, ready. Good.
Sasuke had been the first to arrive, and had dropped his pack while he waited. He was sitting with his back against it, totally relaxed - but he was positioned for the best possible field of view, and his eyes never stopped moving. Conserving energy, but not taking his principal's safety for granted, even at the heart of friendly territory. Good.
*taptaptapTAPTAPTAPskssssshhhhhh*
"Hello, Naruto," he said mildly, with a slight lift of one eyebrow.
The Genin flinched, even as he bent over with his hands on his knees, panting. "Eheheh... Hinata-chan wanted to talk to me... and I'm not -that- late!"
"All right." He gave a quiet snort, then nodded slowly. "Tazuna-san, We're ready whenever you are."
* * * * *
A warm, sunny day was not the best circumstance under which to pay honors to one's deceased. Nevertheless, he kneeled before the simple monument at the edge of the field, and lay a single bluebonnet at its feet. The flower had been his brother's favorite.
"Ohayo, 'Niisan.
"My Genin team has been doing well since graduation. Anko-sensei has asked Kiba and I to try to support Hinata, by praising her successes and helping her find ways to avoid repeating her failures. Oddly, Kiba has had considerably more success at this than I; perhaps an artifact of dogs' social nature and the Inuzuka clan's association with them.
"Overall, I believe that our efforts are bearing fruit. While Hinata continues to stutter, and remains extremely shy and retiring, her ability to operate under pressure has been improving steadily, and she has slowly begun to begin to offer opinions and anecdotes of her own, rather than simply watching while Kiba and I converse.
"Anko-sensei's order that we attempt to teach the others our family taijutsu styles has been particularly effective. Aburame-ryuu's emphasis on avoiding hard impacts and body blows seems to adapt quite well against the Jyuuken's frequent repetition, but is less suited to defeating the Inuzuka clan's grappling techniques. Conversely, however, Kiba has found that placing oneself in any sort of close lock with a member of the Hyuuga clan is tantamount to suicide - while the formal Jyuuken only generates offense from the tenketsu of the fingers and hands, a few moment's concentration can do the same from any part of the body.
"While in the academy, I had always believed that Hinata's grades from our taijutsu instructors was a form of favoritism, brought on by her family's political influence. As the case actually turns out, this was unfair to both her, and our instructors. While she remains unacceptably tenative in actual sparring, I believe that everyone else on the team has been at least as surprised as I was by the level of insight and instructional ability she has shown in -all- forms of hand to hand combat, not just her own preferred Jyuuken style.
"Anko-sensei's comments on the causes and treatment of emotional abuse suggest that healing from it is essentially a matter of willpower - and the more I come to know Hinata, the less credible I find the idea of her ever failing in that respect." He sighed quietly, and settled back from kneeling into full seiza.
"Kiba has successfully mastered most of his clan's hereditary ninjutsu, but is unable to deploy them without the aid of soldier pills. Anko-sensei says that this will continue to be the case for at least the next few months, as the Inuzuka techniques are all B ranked by reason of chakra consumption. Nevertheless, she has had him performing a number of control and stamina exercises in an effort to decrease his reliance on what she calls 'unreliable crutches.'
"More generally, I have found that while my initial evaluation of him as being recklessly agressive and short-tempered is frequently accurate, it is by no means complete. His fearless and arrogant mannerisms cover a considerable degree of observational skill, perhaps even greater than my own. While I have never seen him fail to approach a task within his abilities with ostentatious confidence, he has also proven to have an extremely accurate idea of his own limits, and how they compare to his opponent's.
"For myself, I-" he broke off and looked towards the clearing's entrance as his kikai reported a familiar scent. "Ohaiyo, Kabuto-niisan."
"Ohaiyo, Shino-kun." There was silence for a moment as the older Genin knelt and made his own offering.
"Neshan-niisan is not here," Shino observed eventually - although, as usual, there was little to indicate what he thought about the fact.
"He's on a mission." No more than that was needed, not when all concerned, - speaker, spoken-to, spoken-of and departed - were shinobi, and subject to the same code and expectations. They understood about duty, and so did not need to speak further.
An early cicada rasped. Shino, whether prompted by the insect or some aspect of his own character, shifted slightly and asked, "When they... told us what had happened... everything came from Neshan's report. I realize that you probably do not wish to speak of it, but... it would be... comforting to have even a little clearer idea what happened."
Kabuto was quiet for a long moment, and the younger boy heard a reply in the silence, and so breathed a pained sigh and shifted, preparing to stand and go.
"The client had said that there would be no ninja."
Shino was confused for a moment, but then he understood and composed himself to listen.
"The target and the client were both major merchants, and the first owed the second quite a bit of money. We ha been retained to capture the target and obtain from him the location of sufficient properties and accounts to pay his debt - or as close to it as his means allowed.
"As far as we knew going in, the target was alone in his estate except for about two dozen guards and the night's paid entertainment. So, we used our standard formation for non-ninja targets - Neshan in front to draw their fire and attention, then me close behind to cover him, then your brother some distance back with his kikai spread as a warning net, and to allow him to direct us to targets we would otherwise have missed.
"There were twenty-five guards, as advertised, but they were expecting us. That night's courtesan was a Cloud kunoichi, and the rest of her team had infiltrated themselves among the guards.
"Standard procedure for an operation of the type that we -thought- we were facing is to secure the target first, then neutralize his protectors after it has been assured that he can no longer escape.
"When we entered the target's bedchamber, the Cloud-nin hit Neshan witha genjutsu that had him almost unconcious - I interrupted her before she could finish him, but I wasn't strong enough to defeat her quickly."
Shino became very still at what his kikai were smelling.
"I knew that her partners were attacking him - I could hear them fighting - but until Neshan recovered I could only hope he'd be able to hold out long enough."
"He couldn't," Shino said, voice thick.
"But he took both of them with him," Kabuto answered, with a kind of sad pride that Shino could only understand now that he was with his -own- Genin cell.
There was peace for a moment, and then the very birds in the trees went deathly silent with the tension as the younger asked the elder, "Why did you lie?"
Kikai exploded from their hive clusters deep in his body to race back and forth across the channels just beneath his skin, trying to be ready for the threat they felt. Despite the unsettling sensation, Shino held very still - he was quickly realizing just how unwise it would be for him to provoke the coldly calculating mind behind what had, until just a moment ago, been the calmest of eyes.
"Your destruction bugs smelled it."
"Yes."
And then Kabuto blinked, and was simply a kind, brotherly medic-nin once more. "Because many people would be hurt, if what I'm hiding gets out."
And the kikai smelled that it was the truth.
"If it were only me, I'd have done whatever it took to help him."
And that was also the truth.
"But, under the circumstances, I had - and have - a responsibility to my family... even if it risks my teammates."
Truth.
"And they knew and accepted that."
Truth.
That was all that Shino needed or wanted, but he also had a duty. "Is your secret a threat to Konoha?"
"Not if I have anything to say about it."
Truth.
Kabuto hesitated, then: "For what it's worth... I'm sorry."
"So am I."
It did not occur to Shino until much later - and much too late - that Kabuto had not actually said 'no.'
* * * * *
He didn't need the Byakugan to practice strikes, and so didn't see her coming out of the forest behind him. Nevertheless, she knew that the quiet sounds of her stride and the subtle feel of her chakra told him of her presence even before she spoke.
"Neji-niisan?"
"Hinata-sama." He turned to look at her, and his voice and face were calm - but an unspoken chill and the tension around the corners of his eyes set her heart sinking in her chest.
"I..." she paused, then plunged ahead. "The Hyuuga clan... -needs- to change. When, when we left the Lightning Country, the two-family system... stopped being neccessary. The longer we keep it, the more harm it does, pain it causes. I... I'll be the clan head, but... I won't be able to change things without at least one ally in the Branch family. If, if you want your children to be free of the Caged Bird seal, then... I know that you've... been hurt. I know that, that you probably hate me. I know you have a right to. But..."
He looked at her as she trailed off, and his face was very cold, indeed. "You know nothing. I don't know why you even feel the need to try, but -no- -one- can alter destiny's decrees, let alone someone with your fate of weakness and cowardice. The heavens have appointed the Hyuuga's fate of suffering and hatred, and neither of us can hope to alter it... any more than -you- could hope to defeat me." Something red-fanged and shadowy seemed to stalk in the echoes between his last words.
"You're wrong, Neji-niisan. People... -I-... -can- change. I will. I -have-." Her eyes narrowed slightly as she shifted her weight back and raised her hands into the first stance of the Jyuuken. "And I will prove it to you."
His face, somehow, grew even colder as he matched her readiness. "As a member of the Branch House of the Hyuuga, it is my duty to aid and educate the heir, and try to keep her from folly." She had known he would accept. There had been a chance, a hope, that he would be able to see shy, quiet Cousin Hinata rather than just another main house member - and at that moment and for years to come, she would always wonder if another set of words might have let him do so. But he hadn't, and so all he could think after her challenge was that here, at last, was a member of the hated 'them' who had murdered his father... and that she was within his reach.
Just as she knew, now if not at the beginning, that he could never heal unless he was shown exactly how he was wrong, exactly how free he was. "Just as it is my duty as Heir, to guide and protect those who have lost their way, and forgotten what it means to be family."
He flinched, and paled, enough to be noticable to normal eyes rather than just Byakugan. Then his lips pulled back in vicious snarl. "A CAGED BIRD HAS NO FAMILY!"
His rage nearly cost him the fight as she slipped outside of his leading right hand, and though he managed to avoid the strike that would have slammed across the side of his head and sent him out for the count with a five-day migrane - if he was lucky - the twist of his body and the momentum of his charge left him completely unable to avoid her outstretched leg. He tried to recover - twisted, failed, fell, crashing to the ground with all his weight and speed grinding his left arm across the ground. When he rose and spun towards her - just in time to block her kick - a seeping mass of blood was spreading over a patch of stripped skin and embedded dirt from wrist to elbow.
She backed off a step, then came in again, leading with her left arm. With his damaged like that, immobilizing his right arm would give her a serious advantage - and did, as the locked limbs twisted off to one side and let her naturally rotate her body in closer for a strike against...
The bleeding on his left arm was even more superficial than it looked, and that hand flashed in a long flurry of strikes that scattered pinpricks of fire across her entire right arm. Her palm strike still broke his nose, but the blue flare that would have marked a proper hit was completely absent.
She twisted the other arm around his and slapped her palm against his shoulder. He flinched, and recoiled, leaving them almost at arms' length. His attack had been typical Hyuuga work, precise and deceptively effective, sealing her tenketsu, the external opening points that let her vent chakra for the Jyuuken's strikes - or redistribute her body's energy to operate the limb's muscles. Her strike, on the other hand, had turned her greatest problem into a strength.
The Hyuuga's reputation and the effectiveness of their Gentle Fist taijutsu style concealed a serious weakness - the same genes that passed on the Byakugan were closely, perhaps inextricably linked with an unusually low natural chakra capacity. While the lesser flow made precise control easier, many Hyuuga Genin had to struggle to muster the power for more than a Bunshin or two, and only a rare handfull would ever improve enough to be able to perform more than a single Kaiten before collapsing in exhaustion. A large part of Neji's reputation as a genius was due to the fact that his chakra reserves were actually quite normal - a trait inherited from his mother.
Hinata was a sport, an individual in whom the collision of random, otherwise ordinary genes had produced an effect entirely different from the usual. Where other Hyuuga could direct their chakra with instinctive, casual precision, she struggled. Where they seethed, she grieved.
And where her kin husbanded the contents of a meagre pool of power, and even Neji worked from a simple mountain lake, she held back a sea fit to rival any genius of the Uchiha or Sarutobi.
That simple slap had delivered far more chakra than Neji's system was prepared to channel, and the effect was much like that of a lightning strike on an open power grid. His body would heal the damage eventually, in a few weeks alone or days with the right medical assistance, but in the meantime that shoulder would be useless, and likewise the arm beneath it.
His working arm struck, once, twice, three times before she blocked the fourth and grabbed his wrist as he pulled back. For a long, painful moment she felt her heart stop in her chest before fear kicked it back into operation and set it hammering against her ribs.
Then she jumped - bracing herself against his wrist and shoulder - and brought her knees up against her chest. His eyes widened.
She wasn't able to put very much chakra into the kick that sent him staggering back and threw her out and away in a long, low flip, but what she -could- do was enough to double him over, retching helplessly as she landed and looked up and across the small clearing at him.
"Neji-niisan... Why are you so angry with me?"
He coughed one last time and snarled at her. "Why? You have the nerve to ask? I thought you were different. I thought you were better than them. And instead, you play politics and power games, twisting everything you can reach." He planted one foot underneath himself and lunged upright, good arm leading. "You're just like the rest."
She flinched, fell back one step, two. "I-i-i... No! It's n-n-not-"
"SHUT UP!" he roared, lunging half the distance between them before pulling up and visibly forcing himself back to some semblance of control. "I don't see any more point to this. Hinata-sama."
"B-but-"
"If you're going to accept a fate as just another manipulative little bitch," he snarled, overriding her quiet words, "you'll need to do something about that stutter."
She flinched, but when he turned to go she managed to force a word out. "WAIT!" He stopped, but did not turn, so she walked around in front of him. "Not even the clan head can change the Hyuuga alone, Neji-niisan. I need your help to do what we both want to happen. And if you won't believe me... then I'll have to start by finding a way to convince you. I -am- telling the truth, whatever you're afraid of. All I ask is that you tell me how to prove it."
He snorted and stormed past her.
Once she felt his chakra signature leave her senses, Hinata collapsed down to her knees and looked up to the sky with a quiet, plaintive little wail. "I said... to -him-...?"
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w00t, I say. w00t.
Lemme know what you think!
Ja, -n
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"V, did you do something foolish?"
"Yes, and it was glorious."