Otaku Reflected 

Episode Three, Eva Revolution 

Part Six 

A Superspy in the Knight 

by Jared Ornstead 
  
=====

    Jared vaulted over a low wall, cradling a rifle close by his side 
as the surfaces around him pinged with other's missed shots. Rolling 
across the ground he yanked a grenade from off his bandoleer using his 
off hand and pulled the pin with his teeth, tossing the object in the 
direction of his foes as he scrambled for cover. He sprang up and shot 
a row of his attackers before ducking back behind a post and dropping. 
The superspy was about to spider crawl under a web work of branches 
when four grenades rolled to a stop before his face. 
    They exploded. 
    Jared emerged coughing from the rolling clouds of multicolored 
smoke, covered in four colors of paint and tearing off his protective 
face mask. His classmates let up a cheer of victory. 
    Priss was applauding as well. "Very good, Jared." She shot him a 
point and a grin. "Even the best can be brought down by numbers." She 
turned a nasty smirk to the rest of the class. "So now that you've had 
a chance to play bullies, let's divide you up into teams and play some 
'Divide and Slaughter'. Where the *rest* of you get to find out what 
it's like to be outnumbered." 
    Massive groans ensued. 

    "Rei, what is it?" One of the half-angel clone's new friends asked. 
For the first time since she had begun thawing, the girl was sitting 
stiffly frozen, staring off into space. 
    Well, not exactly space. 
    One of her other friends followed her gaze. "Jared? Why are you 
staring at him for? I mean, he's a hunk, but you're as much of a hero 
as he is. You just haven't gotten as good a chance to fight is all." 
    Struggling, the clone answered. "Jared abilities are superior to 
mine in piloting. It is not the cause of my attention in this case, 
however." 
    "So what's the drool for?" A third friend asked. 
    All three quieted instantly when a small trail of blood escaped one 
of Rei's nostrils to coast down her face. She answered them. "I just 
had the functional differences in boys and girls explained to me by my 
commander." 
    The three friends took counsel together a small way off. 
    "Sick, she *can't* be falling in love with her brother!" 
    A cute girl tossed a look in said brother's direction, watching him 
lithely perform on the gymnastics equipment. "Um, I hate to tell you 
this, but *I* would, in her place." 
    No one disagreed with the girl. 
    "This is bad. We've got to set her on the right path!" 
    "Yes!" One vigorously agreed with the former. "By getting him 
first!" 
    Vigorous agreement came on three sides. 

    Sylia stood in the midst of their vastly reworked classroom, beside 
bulky simulator-style, pod-like devices, each with an open hatch and a 
couch inside. The desks had been all pushed back to the rest of the 
floor space to make room. She gestured to one and told the class their 
introduction. "These are first generation implanted learning capsules, 
each of them capable of bestowing an equivalent to a college education 
in a specific field of study. Today they are set for athletics, dance 
and martial arts in a combined overview package..." 
    Everybody stared at the slam of the door to see Toji, looking 
despondent and miserable, returned to class at last. 
    "You may take your seat." Sylia nodded to him politely. "The class 
representative will inform you of changes to the regimen and course 
work since you have been gone." 
    Toji just stared at her, giving no indication of respect at all. 
"Who are you? And where is our regular teacher?" 
    Sylia merely smiled more knowingly. "The former teacher of this 
class is probably busy exploring the seafloor of what *used* to be 
Amsterdam. He has received a research grant and is busy in that field. 
I am your new instructor, Dr Sylia Stingray. Now you may be seated." 
    Knowing that he wasn't up against some mere substitute, Toji sulked 
off to his seat. He no sooner got there than Kensuke was whispering 
about the changes and why they'd had them. He'd gotten no further than 
the third sentence when Toji sprang out of his seat shouting. "WHAT DO 
YOU MEAN WE GOT THE ROBOT PILOT IN OUR CLASS!!?!" 
    Jared coughed into his hand, having expected this. "Ah, that would 
be me, actually." 
    Toji charged at him, knocking aside spare desks in his progress. A 
fist came down which the redhead casually dodged, then asked. "Care to 
tell me what this is all about?" 
    Rubbing his fist (which had struck the wood desk) the enraged 
student shouted. "You killed my father!!" 
    "Fine, want to kill mine?" Jared dodged another fist. 
    "Huh?" Toji stopped in his tracks, having been momentarily shaken 
out of his anger. 
    Jared looked away, hands clasped calmly behind his back. "You have 
an honorable and a loving father who is dead. Mine was Gendo Ikari. 
Would you *really* want to trade?" 
    Toji backed up a step. Even as grieved as he'd been he'd heard 
about *that* scandal. Then his face grew flat and tightened his hands 
into fists. "Yeah, like father like son, I guess. How..." 
    He flew back thirty feet, sprawling desks in his almost lateral 
backward progress until he hit the far wall and slumped down, blood 
dripping freely from his nose. 
    Jared lowered the foot he'd used to kick him, appearing *mad!* "Mr 
Toji, I kill things for a living. I am very good at it. In fact my 
*being* good at it is often the only thing standing for the survival of 
the human race. I didn't seek your home out of spite. I DIDN'T cause 
your father to take those sleeping pills so he missed the alarm to 
evacuate. I can no more stop causing avalanches in that giant robot 
than you can prevent causing loose sand to move when you run on it. I 
feel deep regret that your family has suffered, but nothing that I did 
was meant to cause that any more than your breathing in and out right 
now is a hostile act toward me. If I *didn't* fight then every man, 
woman and child on this planet would probably be dead, along with all 
of their cattle, their sheep, their pets, their fish and their dogs. 
All of them could be gone for good if there were another impact like 
the last one." 
    The redhead paused to look at the stunned student. "So I appreciate 
your grief. But if you can think of anything that I might have done 
differently, let me know. I'd like to hear it." 
    The pilot of Thunder Knight straightened his desk and sat in it. 
"In any case, the insult I *won't* put up with is a comparison to Gendo 
Ikari. I'd abandoned that family and that family name long before you 
even knew about it. I brought it up as an illustration that pain can be 
far worse than what *you've* had to go through. And the struggles to 
get a new clan to take me were worse than anything you're going through 
right now. Sorry, but life can suck worse than to lose your pop." His 
eyes went straight ahead. 
    Toji had no idea what to say. 
    Sylia cleared her throat. "If I may continue?" She asked in her 
best teacher voice, which was pretty good, actually. "The learning 
capsules have been programed in a general course in physical and 
related athletic skills, worth a college degree, but not true mastery 
of any of them. The data can be implanted in about an hour to two 
hours, but it will require at least a week before your brains can fully 
process the information and assimilate it. From that point you can 
continue to refine the knowledge on your own and add to it, just as if 
it were learned the normal way. We'll also be giving you the second 
skill implant at that time, which will be your standard educational 
courses." 
    Hikari, the class rep, raised her hand. "Excuse me, teacher. Why 
don't we get the educational knowledge downloaded into us first?" 
    Sylia remained enigmatic and diverted the question. "Dr Saotome?" 
    Jared stood up. "It was a question of priorities, really. Whether 
you have the school knowledge now or several months from now makes no 
difference as far as graduation, and none of you guys have jobs. Lack 
of immediate requirements made it a lower priority than the athletics, 
where the sooner you begin to develop your bodies, the stronger, 
faster, and more agile they will grow. There was also the small matter 
of my own training, where equals to race against or challenge me could 
spur my own development to higher levels, with the potential benefit of 
higher performance leading to us all having a better chance of 
surviving this war." 
    "Oh." Hikari said, round-eyed. 
    "Are there any potential dangers to this?" Kensuke asked under his 
raised hand. 
    Jared looked back at Sylia. "Dr Stingray?" 
    She watched him sit down, then instructed the class. "Several 
actually, though we have done what we can to minimize them. The 
equipment is reliable, but we can't ignore the chance that some spy 
agency will get the idea to program you to be obedient agents. Since 
secrets are their business we would never know if they intended such a 
thing or not, so our precautions have to act on the assumption that 
they would. Toward defusing that, we have constructed these from base 
parts, smelted and fabricated at our own factory with the best quality 
assurance and security money can buy." ~And better than that, actually, 
as our boomers guards are an unknown quantity to our enemies and cannot 
be bribed.~ "Further, we isolated them completely from all outside 
influences. They cannot be communicated with through radio or other 
signals, are insulated from interference and have their own internal 
power. All of which means a foe would have to physically access the 
machines in order to tamper with them, and they are under armed guard 
24 hours a day." 
    She paused to look at the wide-eyed class, then sat down on the top 
of her desk. "We have taken the matter very seriously because of the 
risk involved. But if any of you wish to withdraw to a normal class you 
may do so rather than undergo this rather unorthodox training." 
    Some of the class squirmed, but no one did anything. 
    The teacher became very reassuring. "Don't worry, there's no risk 
of that happening. It would require a global conspiracy to have the 
resources to hack this technology." ~And because we know that's what 
we're up against, we have taken the precaution of setting up this dummy 
equipment, which according to Jay-chan's suggestion is all perfectly 
useless. A very small medical probe that will be taped on to 'monitor' 
all of you during the procedure will actually be accomplishing the 
implant. Since it shares no parts nor programming with the large, bulky 
machines that will be our enemies' targets, you should be fine, 
especially as the conspirators know nothing of this technology.~ 
    Jared met Sylia's eyes, and they shared as if by telepathy. 
~There's no way to hide the fact that we're using technology that 
doesn't exist here. The enemy will know something is up. Let's only 
hope and pray that our diversion works in throwing them off.~ 

    "This is most disturbing." A large holographic monolith marked '03' 
commented. 
    "We appear to have lost control. The Marduke Institute is acting 
independently. We may have to purge it." '05' answered the first. 
    "I disagree." Mentioned a block labeled '08'. "We've done a check 
of their mainframe and discovered instructions commanding them to do 
this, delivered in the same way that we sent ours, anonymous security 
intrusion." 
    Nothing was said for several seconds. 
    "So they are following orders?" Two protested. 
    "Yes, just not ours. It would be interesting to know where they 
came from." said Six. 
    "I suspect Gendo. He's the one that betrayed us." Five replied. 
    "Distinctly possible. However, why hasn't Number Four joined us?" 
    Chairman Keele spoke, overriding that inquiry. "He no longer 
concerns us, and will be replaced in short order. Do we have the 
technology the Marduke is using?" 
    Everyone politely said nothing about the comment on Number Four, a 
certain death sentence had been given if the man wasn't already dead. 
Number Eight answered the latter question without skipping a beat. "It 
was not on their mainframe, only a note that the details would be 
hand-delivered, and not to put it on any computer." Statements moved so 
swiftly from there it was difficult to say who said what. 
    "An obvious attempt to keep it away from us. Whoever gave those 
instructions had to know we would be interested to make such an 
obstructive attempt." 
    "I find myself interested that whoever it was had the knowhow and 
the resources to put this into operation, not to mention how they seem 
to have duplicated our methods and predicted our own next move." 
    "It is simply impossible that technology of this level could have 
developed without our being aware of it, independent of the resources 
we control." 
    "There aren't supposed to be any secrets from us. We own the UN, 
every national government, the spy agencies and the militaries, not to 
mention all of the private industries worth owning and several major 
religions. It isn't likely that a hillbilly thought up anything so 
ground-breaking, and implemented it in his garage." 
    "Especially not sending it through our own secure methods to an 
agency we control." 
    "Yet anything larger than a single eccentric genius working in 
secret is either owned directly by ourselves, our companies, or the 
agencies that we control. That this escaped our attention until it was 
already implemented hints of something." 
    Betrayal, though nobody said it. 
    "Someone was disguising this for it to reach this far unnoticed." 
    Okay, somebody said it. 
    "Possibly Gendo, he's had unlimited resources for some years now, 
and access to leading thinkers and technologies, with the ability to 
keep things secret, though we did not imagine to this extent." 
    "What could he hope to gain, I wonder?" 
    "Order his termination. We ought to have destroyed him for that 
book he published. It... complicated things." Keele went on without 
lessening his scowl. "Send backup agents to assist Kaji, it seems we 
will have more work there than one man can do." 
    "I have... uncovered a problem," came the whiny voice of Six. 
    "What is it *now*?" growled Chairman Keele, he hadn't seen so many 
of his strings being cut since the days when he'd cursed the Savior of 
Mankind. 
    "There are indications that Gendo's fleeing was planned in advance. 
I have been unable to determine if this was due to his planning for all 
contingencies, or if..." Six's voice trailed off as if he didn't want 
to contemplate the thought. 
    "If he actually intended these events to transpire," finished 
Three. "Could it be he has contact with one of THEM?" 
    "THEY are gone, finished. The last of the those were hunted down a 
century ago." Keele sneered. THEY couldn't possibly have survived, he 
had made sure of it. Still, if they had... "Impossible. If they were 
still active, then they have their own agenda and would have been 
keeping their survival secret from us for over a hundred years." 
    "God has been known to reactivate them." 
    "Considering what THEY were capable of, and how they were hunted, 
IF any were to have survived they would have to have kept hidden, and 
could have spent a century just recovering from the devastation." Three 
pointed out, sounding uncomfortable. 
    "Nonsense," said Keele. "It was for the purpose of destroying them 
that we gained control of mass religion and stamped out true faith. God 
cannot perform miracles without faith to precede them. He cannot have 
called another prophet." 
    "Of course," seconded Six. 
    "Couldn't possibly be," agreed Five. 
    There was an uncomfortable silence before the obelisks faded, 
leaving Keele alone. 
    The old man's head slowly rose. "I sense a presence. One I have not 
felt in..." Keele turned without another word to exit the building. 
    A dragonfly detached itself from the wall, sped into an air duct, 
passed through a tiny hole, entering a maze of fissures, and finally 
flew out into the mountains. After a brief trip, it landed on a girl's 
open palm. The girl placed the little dragonfly on a device the size of 
a laptop computer and clicked a couple of switches. 
    "This is most disturbing," said a tinny voice from the laptop's 
speakers as the recording was played back. The sexaroid listened, 
recorded,  encoded, and sent the data to Sylia. She'd know what to do 
with it. 

    The nurse bent over Yui, removing connectors and biomed monitors so 
the young girl could sleep more peaceably. Her condition had changed 
over an hour ago, from a coma to ordinary sleep, and they expected her 
to wake up normally. 
    Behind the nurse's back, very carefully timed, the door silently 
swished open and admitted a dark man with a gun in his right hand. The 
silenced pistol spoke once, not even audible outside of the small room, 
and the back of the nurse's dress acquired a hole, driving the woman's 
body down across the bed, over her patient. 
    Gendo held the smoking sidearm and fought the urge to laugh. He 
loved killing, most especially women, and as the head of a prestigious 
organization he'd had to restrain himself else his activities would be 
discovered and poison his position - a condition that no longer 
existed, removing that small restraint. 
    Still holding the pistol in one gloved hand, the black and 
rotten-souled villain crossed over to the bedside, reaching out with 
one hand intending to yank the body away from the top of his beloved 
(as much as that servant of evil could love anything) wife. 
    As his hand fell on her shoulder the nurse's arm came up and 
trapped it. Whipping around she lashed out with a concealed knife and 
the madman's arm fell severed to the floor as he staggered back in 
astonishment. 
    The nurse tore out of her skin, shredding free of it as she 
reverted to form as a C-class military combat boomer, complete with 
heavy armor and armaments. Plates on her arms, chest and head opened up 
as she readied a heat laser, a tactical mistake as with that delay 
Gendo simply fled the room and her main weapon only melted the doorway 
behind him. Vents on her calves and back opened up and the revealed 
combat boomer sped off after the fleeing criminal. Behind her, in Yui's 
room, a small closet opened and another guard and nursing boomer 
stepped out to perform her duties, waiting behind a curtain for a 
decent interval in case the quarry circled back to attempt to enter the 
'unguarded' room. 
    No such luck, Gendo got away that day. His knowledge of secret 
passages and the defenses of NERV allowing him to evade his pursuit in 
spite of bleeding profusely from a severed limb. 

    A van pulled up at the Skylord Mansion, disgorging uniformed 
hospital staff and a very weak Yui Ikari, being helped into the house 
where the occupants stood ready to greet her. 
    "Good to see you, miss Ikari." Ritsuko bowed to her. 
    "Welcome, mother." Rei bowed also. 
    "Hi!" Jared caroled. 
    "Oh! I'm *so* lad to finally meet you!" Misato barreled into the 
young girl and held her consumed in a gigantic hug. "Your son has been 
exposing all sorts of problems and helping us out in ways that are just 
impossible to describe! We all owe our lives to him. You should be 
proud." 
    The fair haired Yui returned Misato's hug a little hesitantly. "Of 
course." She sighed, looked around the captain to regard Jared. "But 
I'm afraid I have a secret to reveal. I am not Jared's mother." 
    The tableau froze instantly. 
    Yui sighed, ducked her head and continued. "Being in that Eva for 
so long, the only things I could think on were my regrets, and chief of 
those were that I never told Jared the truth. You see, my birth son was 
named Shinji, but he was born without a spine and lived only a few 
minutes." Yui refused to look up at them. "Gendo had my son switched 
with his brother's child, born the same day, and covered it up." 
    Ritsuko was blinking. her mother had probably been involved in 
that. "So that would mean, with the marriage dissolved..." she 
concluded, looking between Yui and Jared. "That you two are not related 
at all." 
    Jared had frozen into a solid block of ice at the astonishment. 
    "Well," Rei blinked. "It turns out his mysterious past has caught 
up with him." 
    Jared's block of ice fell over, leaving him stuck in astonishment 
on his side. 
    "When he did the DNA trace, he only compared Yui to Rei, never 
himself." Ritsuko supposed aloud. "He just took his own relationship 
for granted, which turned out to be a mistake." 
    "This really is starting to sound like some kind of series, maybe a 
soap opera." The darkhaired Misato posed. 
    Yui gently clasped her hands before her. "So Jared. We're not 
related, so..." 
    "That would mean I am unrelated to him as well." Rei postulated. 
"And so..." 
    The ice shattered and Jared ran screaming over the horizon. 
    All of the girls looked at each other. 
    "He'll be back." Misato concluded, folding her arms happily. "If 
nothing else he'll be unable to resist the next time a battle turns 
up." 
    "Can I show you to your room?" Ritsuko asked of Yui. The 
fourteen-year-old gave a glad nod in reply. They walked in the main 
room and the younger girl saw something on a wall. 
    "Ritsuko? Isn't that you? Why would you pose for a swimsuit 
calender?" 

    The battle came the next day. 
    For Jared it was a relief when the next dark angel arrived. He knew 
he'd have to kill it, and he had an idea of how (a basic recreation of 
the series in this case, as the thing's attack and defense strength was 
just phenomenal), but he was aiming to get hurt less this time as he 
was considerably less stupid than Shinji. 
    Or so he hoped, by his track record it wasn't clear so far. 
    The youth stepped out in his third generation plugsuit and ran to 
join his Thunder Knight, vaguely aware that this alert had come minutes 
before they were going to try the first tests of Eva Unit Six, or Yui's 
Muscle Knight as she'd decided to take control over it. 
    He jumped up to the shoulder of his Eva, into the plug, and was 
inserted. 
    "Initiating primary connections." Maya in the command center calmly 
proclaimed, going through the routine when suddenly everything went 
haywire. "Synch ratio has jumped to 400%! We've lost all contact with 
the pilot!" 
    "What?!?" By now the command crew were getting somewhat used to 
surprises from this pilot. It was becoming a theme. But nothing had 
prepared them for this one, as the Thunder Knight just calmed down and 
settled, reducing power to standby levels. 
    There was no trace of the pilot. 
    "Oh, no." Yui and Ritsuko echoed each other. 

    ~I feel... most peculiar.~ Jared thought. 
    ~Wait a moment. I recognize this dreamscape. Only... that's right, 
there *wouldn't* be any inhabitant. I saved Yui the other day.~ 
    There came an eternity of thought. 
    ~Great. I'm stuck in the Eva. I wonder if they'll be able to get me 
out.~ The thought came close on that's heels about the latest attack 
and that particular bad guy's power level. ~No, I don't think so.~ 

    "What happened to him!!?" Misato shouted, for once missing the 
presence of a cooling influence in the presence of the commander. She 
squashed that thought. He'd never been any help anyway. 
    Ritsuko deferred to Yui, who was checking monitors while she spoke. 
"The Eva unit has absorbed him, taken his soul for it's own." 
    "WHAT!!" Hair stood up from every head in that center. 

    ~I've been taken out of this fight.~ 
    Some long pondering followed that realization. 
    ~If an empty Eva soaks up whoever gets into it, then Yui can't use 
her Knight without the same thing happening to her. That leaves Rei and 
Frost Knight. They're sadly incapable of taking this bad guy on alone.~ 
    There came a drawn out mental sigh. 
    ~Well, I guess it's time to break some more rules then.~ 

    Three technical staffers for Nerv were standing in a hallway 
gathered around a drink machine when one of them heard a clank and all 
three turned around to look at something sneaking along behind them 
that made their faces pale. 
    "Well, I suppose tiptoeing is out of the question?" It asked. 
     The girl among them opened her mouth and shrieked. Both the guys 
let their drink cans fall to the ground in shock. 
    It waved. "Shhh! None of you notice me. Just go about what you were 
doing." 
    The trio fainted. 
    "Well, good enough, I suppose." The mysterious figure went on. 

    Without a steadying influence, the command center had quickly 
dissolved into horror. It wasn't that Gendo had been particularly 
*good* about organizing things. It was just having a central authority 
to keep some kind of direction going had gone missing. That, and Misato 
was finding being in the dark about critical things until they were 
already emergencies was a habit she wanted her friends to break, and 
was telling them so loudly. 
    Thus it was that nobody noticed the outcome of certain monitors 
until a shriek split up the commotion in the room. All the attention 
was drawn to the Evangelion Unit One standing in door to the the 
human-sized command area. 
    With some negotiating to fit its shoulders through, the seven foot 
tall Thunder Knight stepped inside, worked its mouth for a few seconds, 
then began to speak without opening its jaw. "Misato, status report on 
the dark angel." 
    It was horribly creepy, but the command was so familiar she was 
looking at the monitor before she'd realized what she was doing. "It's 
taken position over Tokyo-3, and has deployed some kind of enhanced 
drill..." She trailed off and her hair stood on end when she realized 
that she'd just answered an Eva unit that talked. 
    Maya was a bit more calm about things, partially because Ritsuko 
was blocking her view. "Estimate it will penetrate the Geofront in 
eleven hours, thirty four minutes, just after midnight tonight." 
    Having other people act professionally was calming a few nerves, 
but the Eva unit standing among them was fraying a few more. It climbed 
up to the command chair, settling itself down. Again, it spoke without 
moving its mouth. "Yui, Thunder Knight has absorbed me, yet I remain in 
control. I suspect it is a side effect of my having circumvented most 
of their controls, but I think you might want to rethink some of this 
technology." 
    The humanoid Knight sighed introspectively. "Right now I really 
ought to be rescued by the resident Brilliant Scientist of the series. 
Of course, we're lacking one in our group of heroes, so next we'd go 
for one in the support group or, failing that, they've got to go find 
one. Trouble is, none of you are UP to any of that. So I've got to 
arrange my own." 
    "But... what about?" Ritsuko pointed a finger at herself. 
    "Well, no. Meaning no offense, but you're a Recovering Evil 
Henchwoman. There's lots of good reasons for you to be around, telling 
us about enemy secrets and whatnot, but we're not allowed to trust you 
fully until you come to your senses and risk yourself for us in a deep, 
emotional moment where you rise beyond what's asked and fling yourself 
selflessly into danger on our behalf." 
    Misato found herself nodding in agreement almost against her will. 
    Yui was almost looking hurt. "But... there's *me*, isn't there? I 
would've done my best to save you. Really, I would." 
    "I know that. But you're our Hero Thought Lost, and someone's due 
to kidnap you any minute now, I'm *sure* of it! As for the rest of 
you... *sigh!* You know if I could have counted on you to perform up to 
spec none of this silly walking around when I ought to be helpless 
would be necessary! You'd go and save Yui and then she'd rise above all 
of her previous challenges to come up with the secret for saving me in 
the nick of time and all would be well - After a mighty fight scene 
where we utterly tromp the bad guy." 
    "How did you get your Knight down to this size?" Ritsuko asked, 
professional calm be laughed at, she'd already HAD her world destroyed. 
This was almost restorative in its absurdity. Yui also gave a nod, 
backing up the same question. She knew the dangers of shrinking those 
things. 
    Thunder Knight responded, shaking its head. "There's still so much 
that you just don't know about these Knight units. The AT field is a 
wild card, it can be used to accomplish just about anything. Currently 
I am dividing mine between three functions; operating myself, having a 
localized warp space around me so that, although I remain a couple 
hundred feet high, I interact with this world as though only human 
scale, and a third I'm using for incidentals. Things like flying 
because I can no longer handle stairs, or the broadcast thought 
patterns I'm using to communicate with you. Something about the 
coordination is *very* different from piloting this." 
    Well, the boy sounded sane, relatively speaking of course, and 
still in control. That was reassuring. The *problem* was still freaky, 
but it was something. 
    The Knight was tapping away at a keyboard. "The problem with an AT 
field is a simple matter of energy distribution. Splitting them three 
ways gives each one less power, and so in a contest between, say for 
example, Knights and Dark Angels, if both are equal strength and one 
has to be doing more work than the other with its AT field then the one 
that has its power more concentrated is going to win. Imagine an 
example of a Knight having to fight in an environment that was 
difficult for him but native for the dark angel, if you want a good 
test case." 
    "I see." Misato whispered. "But if a Dark Angel were to be forced 
to defend against simultaneous attacks..." 
    "It would split its AT field to cover them and each defense would 
be weaker. But that covers only a small part of our problem. What you 
don't have any inkling of is the elemental crystals. They are 
specialized, independent power wells. More powerful, because they are 
more tightly focused, but less flexible as well. An AT field can be 
adapted to just about any need, but as any gambler will tell you, a 
wildcard is not a whole hand. The crystals are those other cards, and 
as they are independent with their own source of power, a creature with 
an AT field and a crystal can use one to do one thing and the other to 
do another with no loss of power between them. Then there is the 
regular energy of the Knight unit itself, which you *still* haven't 
learned to distinguish as separate because in normal Muscle Knights all 
of that power flows through their AT field, because it's got nothing 
else to flow into." 
    Thunder Knight blinked and seemed amazed that it was able to do so. 
"That leads to a situation where the equation becomes very complicated. 
With a Lightning crystal I could have a thunder spear in one hand 
without any cost, and use the AT field to fly, then throw all my 
Knight's reserve energy behind either one, the lightning spear to 
attack or the AT field to fly out of range of a strike. It becomes 
tactical decisions that dictate where that power goes. And you can't 
afford to waste it because the reserve energy gets used up and needs 
rest to recover itself. You can only use it in great emergencies 
anyway." 
    The Knight looked up from its awkward typing. "I believe that our 
evil friend up there on the surface is outfitted with a crystal. It's 
something I've suspected about our enemy for quite some time. They 
prefer to remain tightly focused while we gain *our* crystals primarily 
by defeating and absorbing them and theirs. So far it has duplicated 
abilities they've shown very predictably." 
    "What kind of crystal do you think that it has?" Misato asked him 
bravely, feeling it was her job and being reassured slightly by the 
calm familiarity of his voice, even though it came from what was 
looking (the scale making things seem unfamiliar) like a white armored 
madman. 
    "Force fields would be my best bet. Which constitutes a problem, as 
an AT field that is generating a defense can be broken through by an AT 
field used against it. But if a crystal is doing something, it will 
have a slight edge over an AT field attempting the same thing, the same 
as a dedicated, specialized tool is going to be more efficient at its 
task than a general purpose one. A crystal that is generating a defense 
is going to be proof against an AT field directly opposing it. The 
crystal is going to win in any such contest. And unfortunately our AT 
fields are the best we have." 
    "What about throwing in that reserve power you mentioned?" Misato 
demanded. 
    "Misato, that's never something you can plan on. It's unpredictable 
at best, highly erratic or more often unavailable most of the rest of 
the time." The Knight warned. 
    Several of the bridge crew turned white. "Oh." 
    Yui addressed the Knight. "So how are you going to beat that 
thing?" 
    Thunder Knight was incapable of facial expression, but its body 
language displayed concentration. Leaning back in the command chair, it 
held up one finger. "First, I cannot, in my present state, fight for 
much of anything. As I said I'm using up a third of my wild card just 
to operate. I'd have to drive myself into a full berserk fury in order 
to make up for that lack and still overcome another AT field. This is 
worse than a mere AT field and I don't feel much like driving myself 
into a fury." Another finger was raised. "That leads us to Second. 
We've got two knights we *cannot* use, and only one we can. That's a 
losing proposition, we need all of them. Besides, it would be 
dramatically appropriate." 
    Little sweatdrops were sent out everywhere. 
    Ritsuko turned from absorbing all of this to face Yui. "What do you 
think? Can you free him and make your own Knight operational?" 
    The fourteen year old shrugged sorrowfully. "It's inherent to the 
design. They'll grab the soul out of the first person that tries to 
pilot them." 
    A chime binged from the command console. Thunder Knight bent down 
to receive whatever message it was, then seemed to sit a little 
straighter. With awkward fingers, the bulky Knight transferred part of 
that message to the general screen and deleted the rest. All the 
officers blinked as detailed instructions appeared on the command 
bridge main displays and continued to roll past, complete with some 
schematics. 
    The armored head came to focus on the crew. "Implement this." Then 
turned and walked out of the room. 
    "Hey! Where are you going?" Aoba called. 
    The Knight turned partially back. "What? Me? I'm off to go dormant 
for no explained reason so the rest of you can get on with rescuing me. 
TRY not to make any errors this time, okay? I mean we've got fans! You 
can't disappoint them!" 
    Then it was gone. 
    Misato turned to face Ritsuko. "That was probably the oddest 
experience I've ever had in my life." 
    The doctor had to agree. "True, I think it ranks up there among 
mine as well. Let's hope things get a little quieter in the future." 
    Misato snarled playfully, grouching as an aside. "They've been 
going the other way so far." 
    Yui had climbed up on the command console, and using methods best 
left unsaid retrieved the portion of the data file that Jared in his 
shrunken Thunder Knight had erased. As she was projecting this on a 
screen, the entire bridge crew got to see an image of what looked to be 
about a twelve or thirteen year old girl bearing an *amazing* shock of 
red hair and waving playfully. 
    "Hey there!" The recorded girl giggled. "It's been a while hasn't 
it? It always seems that children only call home when they're in 
trouble, doesn't it? Still, getting caught in a soul-absorbing giant 
robot *is* kinda a predicament. What seems to me the basic problem is 
those scientists were trying to add their pilot to the technology 
rather than the other way around. You can fix that, but it'll take a 
bit of work. I'll send the schematic alterations to the design 
sequences over immediately. I hate to use a cliche but you might be 
best served by reversing the polarity of the phase pulse in your neural 
synoptic interface generator. That outta do for now. I'll use those 
designs you sent to work on a more permanent solution to send on a 
little later. But in exchange you'll have to come visit us!" The 
redhaired girl taunted joyfully. "Rose is being her usual self but 
Sasami, Ayeka, Ryoko and I really miss you. You were as much fun to 
play with as Tenchi! And an even *better* Guinea Pig!" 
    The diminutive redhead on the screen flexed her minuscule muscles. 
"I'll get right to work, as we can't have an armored robot coming over. 
It'd ruin *all* of Katsuhito's careful and loving work to have it 
stomping on a garden. Not to mention being a real waste if that world 
got destroyed. So much beachfront property, too." 
    She stuck her tongue out at the camera, pulled down an eyelid, then 
waved merrily. "This is The Greatest Scientific Genius In The Universe, 
signing off!" The child caroled in a melodious and carefree voice. 
    Misato had sweatdropped until her hair was wet. With a strange 
smirk she said. "I think I've got another candidate for my list of 
weird experiences." 
    Ritsuko was shaking her head "I find it hard to believe that a 
youngster could analyze and propose a workable solution to our problem 
in what had to be less than three minutes. She couldn't have had that 
email on her end for any longer than that, and the problem she was 
replying to was very specific. So unless what is happening now was 
staged..." 
    "It must be." Maya had been looking over the diagrams. "This is far 
too detailed work and should have taken hours." She, too, was shaking 
her head. "Unless she really was the greatest genius in the universe, 
that is." 
    Hyuga coughed into his fist. 
    Aoba cleared his throat. 
    "I believe what those two are trying to say is she might be, 
considering Jared's gift for bringing up strange coincidences. Do we 
have anything else?" Maya translated on their behalf. 
    A great number of people stood there staring at each other. 
    Yui stared at the bridge techs, then sighed, surrendering. She had 
been looking over the designs, too. After completing a heartfelt 
exasperated exhale of breath, the diminutive doctor addressed the two 
ladies who were in control. "Unfortunately, this is the closest I can 
guess to correct. I'd never had a solution to this problem before, as 
you might've guessed since I *was* the first one caught in it. If I had 
a month or a few years I could check this." She shrugged. "But the 
theories rely on things I'd never postulated before. It would be worth 
a doctorate just to fully understand some of them. One thing IS for 
sure, it's not a cheap fake." 
    Misato, woman of action, rounded and faced the main screen, 
clenching a fist. "Well, we have less than twelve hours to reactivate 
Thunder Knight, rescue Sky Lord, ready our remaining Muscle Knight for 
combat and prepare *and* execute a plan of battle to eliminate this 
dark angel!" 
    Hyuga leaned over and whispered to Aoba. "I TOLD you we were in a 
sentai series." 
    The latter tech just nodded.