Neon Psychosis Evangelion Discussion

[TEAM_DERRICK]

I approve.

[TEAM_DERRICK]

So, chapter 3. What needs doing?

[Mizagium]

Really? Awesome.

Chapter 3 is still in the planning stages, but will feature at least one Train Scene, but mostly the filler/quasi-development found between Sachiel and Shamshel.

And some stuff for the Inception team.

[TEAM_DERRICK]

Should we brainstorm over facebook chat?

[Mizagium]

I have to go to class in a minute...I'll be back around 7:30 - 8:00.

[TEAM_DERRICK]

okay

[Mizagium]

I am back.

[TEAM_DERRICK]

I propose that Mana get’s mind raped by Arael this time around. It’ll force the whole “you’re not a real person” thing down her throat.
I’d imagine that he’d also make the point that she’s little more than Shinji’s plaything, only existing to give him sexual gratification.
It also makes her sacrifice a tad bit more tragic.

[Mizagium]

We'll worry about that later. Right now, I need an appropriate totem for Shinji.

[TEAM_DERRICK]

His casset player.

[Mizagium]

Why does it only ever play two tracks in the anime?

[TEAM_DERRICK]

I think it has something to do with the last two episodes.
It always played tracks 25 and 26.

[Mizagium]

Shinji was on a train, the kind used throughout Tokyo-3. Outside it was either dawn or dusk. Judging by the orange hue, he guessed it was twilight, but he honestly didn’t know. As the train rattled forward, he heard muffled voices all around him. He tried to find their source, but his only fellow passengers were nondescript shadows, murmuring amongst themselves, ignoring him. Just like everyone else. He faced forward and was met with the stoic face of a gilr his age with sky blue hair.

“Shinji Ikari.” She said his named as a fact and not a question.

“How do you know my name?” he asked.

“I have known you for a very long time, Shinji. Just as you have known me.”

“…Rei, that’s your name, isn’t it.” He was also not asking a question.

“You fought well, Shinji Ikari, against the Third Angel. For one so unacquainted with the parameters of dream sharing, you handled the situation admirably.”

“Dream sharing? You mean…”

“Yes. You fought the Angel within a human mind. You fought it with a dream construct only a handful are able to pilot. And you succeeded.”

“I didn’t succeed.” He looked away. “I only piloted it so that you wouldn’t have to, Rei.”

“I do not understand, Shinji Ikari. We have never met until this moment. If I were called upon to pilot Unit 01, then I would do so without hesitation, regardless of my physical status, although such factors would be irrelevant within the confines of a dream, as I can be anything I wish.”

“But you were there, in a gurney. You were wrapped up in bandages and you were bleeding. You fell out and I couldn’t bear to see someone in pain like that. That’s why…that’s why I couldn’t let you do it.”

Rei remained ever emotionless. “I was not present within the dream labyrinth, Shinji Ikari. I was still undergoing synchronization tests with Unit 00 when Sachiel appeared. They assured me the Third Child would be able to handle the situation alone, and so I continued.”

“Sachiel…who is that?”

Rei tilted her head slightly to one side. “That is the name of the Third Angel.”

“Angels have names?”

“All living things have names, just as you are Shinji Ikari, and I am Rei Ayanami II.”

“Was your mother’s name Rei?”

“My mother?”

“You said you were the second Rei, usually they just use Jr. at the end of their name.”

Rei hesitated. “My mother is…”

“Oh, right. I’m sorry.”

“There is nothing for you to be sorry for, Shinji Ikari.” Abruptly she shifted gears. Her voice never changed from monotone. “You must rest. Most minds would be able to handle the stress asserted on them like yours can. Sachiel was powerful, but he was not the worst.” She rose and crossed the distance.

“Wait…how do you know the Angel’s name?”

Gently, she touched her hand to his face.

-

Shinji awoke to an unfamiliar ceiling. He studied it for a moment, searching for any distinguishing detail before sitting up. He was in a hospital bed, like the one he had seen Rei in. Or hadn’t. The scent of antiseptic filled his nostrils, sterile, uninviting. He hugged his knees close as memories of the battle drifted back.

In truth, he didn’t remember much of the battle, only the beginning, and the end. And the eye. The image of the enormous green eye focused on him was burned into his mind and on the back of his eyelids. Nothing would be able to remove that image form his memory, not ever.

Why do I find it so unsettling? Is it because I never expected it to have an eye? Because it shouldn’t even need an eye? Or maybe it was the way it could see me, or know that I was inside of it. No, that’s ridiculous; it’s just a…robot? It can’t think or know, or… But it did.

Someone knocked at the door. “Shinji? Are you awake? It’s Ariadne.”

“I’m awake,” he said softly.

Slowly the door slid open and Ariadne walked in carrying a tray of food. You’re probably hungry after all that,” she said with grin.

“Yeah, I guess.” He took the tray and fork and picked at the food without really noticing.

Ariadne went to sit on the bed, hesitated, but ultimately sat on the corner. Shinji watched her over his food. She tugged at the kerchief around her neck, which drew his attention to her chest. He quickly averted his eyes, lest she see him.

“You’re probably a bit confused, huh?” she began slowly. “I mean, we kind of threw you in there without much of a warning. They made you pilot that…thing without any training. You’re probably not sure if you’re dreaming or not right now.” She made it an observation, not a question.

Shinji moved his eyes back, careful to keep them on hers. Ever so slightly, he nodded. “Yes, that’s right. When I was fighting the Angel, I thought it was real, but now that I look back on it, I can’t remember how we got to the city in the first place. I guess it was a dream, but how do I know I’m not dreaming right now?”

Ariadne frowned. “Dammit, I wish they’d have given you more information before dropping you and hoping you don’t drown. Luckily you can swim, huh?” She smiled but it vanished upon seeing his distraught face. “I’m going to tell you the truth, Shinji: you are awake. This hospital is real. I am real and so are you. We are in Tokyo-3. More specifically, the hospital ward of Central Dogma, inside the Geofront.”

“I thought the Geofront was part of the dream…or did the dream start after we got here?” He was trying so hard to find a grasp on reality, but in this world of dreams, and dreams within dreams, and Angels…it was almost impossible. He couldn’t imagine doing this on a regular basis like Cobb and Arthur.

She must have recognized his frustration because she spoke soothingly, but not condescendingly. “The Geofront is part of the real world. You were brought down here before being put under. Within the dream, NERV headquarters is replicated because it had to power the Evas down there.”

He finished his food – still unsure of what exactly he ate – Shinji set the tray aside. “But how do you know I’m not dreaming?”

“Because if you are dreaming, then so am I. I’m not here to confuse you, Shinji, I’m trying to help. Like I said before, I’m going to tell you the truth.”

Shinji believed her. She seemed sincere and was the first person to come to see him. Cobb has just pulled him in and thrown everything at him at once. Arthur and Yusuf and Eames hadn’t helped, either. Whatever their mission was, they were going to carry it out, regardless of Shinji’s understanding.

“So, how do you know we aren’t dreaming? Cobb said dreams feels real while we’re in them, and that we can’t remember the beginning of them, that we always start right in the middle. So, how can you tell?”

Ariadne stood and reached into her pocket. “You create a totem, a link to reality.” She revealed a chess piece, either a king or a queen, Shinji couldn’t remember. “Something small that you can carry with you at all times. Something that only you know the exact dimensions of. Something unique.” She turned away from him and placed the piece on the table. Hidden from him, she knocked it over with one finger, testing the weight. It fell exactly as she expected.

“Only you can know you totem. No one else can know or they can recreate it within a dream and fool you. With a totem, you can test whether you are in reality,” she slipped the chess piece away, “or a dream.”

It all made Shinji’s head hurt, so he simply nodded and said, “Okay. I’ll get a totem.”

Ariadne twisted her mouth, shifted on her feet and looked at the door. “Look, Shinji, I have to go. Cobb needs the team and I’m running a little late. Are you going to be okay?”

He smiled. “I’ll be fine. I just need to rest is all.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, go. Don’t let me hold you up.”

She hesitated a moment longer. “Okay. I’ll check on you later, okay?” She waved as she left the room. Shinji waved back but let his hand droop as soon as the door slid shut. The image of the eye found him again, and he pulled his pillow around his head.

-

“What is it you wanted to show me, Yusuf?” Gendo Ikari demanded as soon as he stepped in the room. Fuyutsuki followed close behind, the commander’s stalwart shadow. He adjusted his glasses and waited impatiently to be answered.

Doctors Yusuf and Agaki were huddled close to a computer screen. Ritsuko stood up first. “Commander Ikari,” she greeted formally. He simply nodded.

“Oh, Commander Ikari,” Yusuf said excitedly. “I have some interesting footage from the security cameras.” He didn’t turn around or look away from the screen, which prompted a sideways glance at Ritsuko from Gendo. She nodded and he joined them at the monitor.

“What is it?’ he demanded.

“As you know, it is my job to monitor the NERV staff while they are engaged in the Angel combat missions.” Of course he knew that; he was the one who assigned the job to Yusuf. But Gendo let him continue. “During my monitoring, something extraordinary happened. Shinji…he…its better if I show you. Watch.”

Yusuf sped the recording forward for a minute before resuming normal speed. “Watch. There.” He pointed at Shinji. The boy convulsed in his seat and grasped at his left arm. “He does it again here.” Shinji grasped at his eye and screamed.

“Is there audio?” Gendo demanded.

“Yes, um. Here.” Yusuf had the sound muted because hearing Shinji scream so many times began to irritate him. He rewound it back to the first movement. The first scream was just a cry of pain. The second was a louder version of the first, but the third…the audio filters nearly shorted out from the intensity.

“SACHIEL!”

Yusuf stopped the recording. “People are not supposed to be able to have that range of motion while drugged and in an active dream. It is impossible for people to speak out loud while drugged. Somehow, your son, Commander, managed to do both in a very short tim.”

“What does this mean, Yusuf?”

The Indian Chemist didn’t falter under Gendo’s glare; Cobb had a similar one that he used quite often. “I don’t know right now. By all accounts, this shouldn’t have happened. But then…I’ve never studied one of the Children while they were under. Perhaps as more Angels appear, I’ll obtain more data.”

“Let’s hope you do. Is there anything else?”

“No. Sir.”

“Very well. If something else arises let me know immediately.” Without another word, he turned and left, Fuyutsuki close behind.

When they were safely out of earshot, Fuyutsuki spoke. “Did you notice, Gendo? A number of times during the recording, Shinji’s eyes blinked. And when he shouted the name, they were fully open.”

“Yes, I saw that. It seems we are even less knowledgeable about the Children than we had anticipated.”

“Should we check him for mental contamination?”

“No. Not yet. If it occurs a second time…” he let the answer hang, but Fuyutsuki understood.

“I wonder what it means? In one fell swoop, your son destroyed every notion concerning dreamers.” He smiled. “But then, he is your son, Ikari.”

Yes, he certainly is. Unfortunately.

-

[TEAM_DERRICK]

“Only you can know your totem. No one else can know or they can recreate it within a dream and fool you. With a totem, you can test whether you are in reality,” she slipped the chess piece away, “or a dream.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Yusuf stopped the recording. “People are not supposed to be able to have that range of motion while drugged and in an active dream. It is impossible for people to speak out loud while drugged. Somehow, your son, Commander, managed to do both in a very short time.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Mizagium]

I KNOW WHAT I'M GOING TO DO WITH MARI!

RAPE HER IT'S A SECRET.

[TEAM_DERRICK]

I WANNA KNOW!
btw. Ryan Adkins is now our editor. He loves this.

[Mizagium]

He's reading this? I didn't think he was the type to watch Evangelion...oh well. Awesome!

I changed the Inception-team mission to "rounding up" the Extractors that dispersed after Gehirn was disbanded.

Let's just say...Mari is still her bloodthirsty self, but in a different way.

[Mizagium]

Wait, did I ever share with you guys my constructed history for this universe?

[TEAM_DERRICK]

I don't think so.
The best thing about RA being the editor is that he has indeed never watched Evangelion. He was just reading over chapter 1 (I was reading it during Newspaper. I went to the bathroom and he decided to see what I was up to.) and said, "This is BA! But, it could be better. Mind if I read over all this?"
He can't wait for Chapter 3.

[Mizagium]

that's awesome. You know what? Hearing that makes the headaches worth it. For now.

Anyway, here's my constructed history of Neon Psychosis Evangelion:

The year 2000 was marked by the event know as Second Impact, in which a relatively small meteor impacted Antarctica at 97% light speed, making it impossible to track, and impossible to deflect. The southern continent melted, causing massive climate change as well as a shift in the earth's angel or rotation. But this was a fallacy. In reality, a secret collection of individuals, the spiritual successors of the Illuminati and Free Masons - SEELE - funded an expedition to Antarctica, where they discovered an alien life form that they named Adam. Armed with the Lance of Longinus, the team initiated the Contact Experiment, which awoke Adam. The energy released by his awakening caused the global catastrophe. Only Misato Katsuragi survived the expedition, though she was kept in quarantine for years following the incident, fearing possible mental contamination. Stephen Miles, a professor of psychology was brought in to teach her to resist Adam's influence. He had long since theorized the ability to share dreams and thoughts, but until then, he was regarded as a crackpot. It worked. Misato destroyed all trace of Adam in her mind and spoke for the first time in years. Miles was recruited by SEELE to teach them neurosecurity in the event that more Angels, as they designated Adam, should appear. They founded Gehirn, and set to create an army of dream-sharers to combat the Angels. Dominic Cobb and Mallorie Cobb where a part of the Gehirn research. They loved the dream sharing and pushed far beyond the boundaries of safety, eventually falling into Limbo, where they lived for 50 years. Mal was content, but Cobb wanted to return to the real world, so he convinced her through Inception that this world wasn't real. When they awoke, Mal still thought she was in a dream, and eventually killed herself. This preceded, but did not directly cause, a rash of suicides by students who were unable to distinguish reality from dreams. The existence of Limbo was never revealed to the rest of the students. Gehirn was disbanded, the program deemed a failure. With nowhere else to turn, the Extractors (Cobb included) began an underground dream-sharing culture that evolved into the shady business practices of stealing competitor's ideas. SEELE eventually founded NERV, which was Gehirn under a new logo, but it was too late, the Extractors were gone. They began the painstaking process of recruiting them again. Cobb, on the run from America for the alleged murder of Mal, was desperate to return to his children, so he went back to SEELE. NERV was founded for a purpose, rather than research: to kill the Angels. the Dead Sea Scrolls and Miles' theories pointed to individuals that could affect dreams without alerting the subconscious, and so the Marduk Institute was founded to search for these individuals. Only later did they learn that they would all be 14 year old children. NERV's headquarters, Central Dogma, was constructed inside the Black Moon - the Geofront - in Japan, under Tokyo-3, which was where the Lilith and the Lance of Longinus were found before Adam. Aware that the Angels would try to destroy humanity from within their own minds, NERV Forgers Eames and Ritsuko Agaki constructed the Evangelions. The Evas were designed and stored within the MAGI supercomputer in Tokyo-3. Yui Ikari was one of the test pilots, specifically of Evangelion Unit 01. During the test, she was killed within the dreamscape, something previously deemed impossible. Another test pilot, Kyoko Zeppelin Soryu was nearly killed in the test of Unit 02, but escaped with severe mental illness. She later hanged herself. Ironically, it would be their children - Asuka and Shinji - who would later pilot those very save Evas. Asuka was picked up early on by the German branch of NERV and trained as an Extractor, but Shinji was left alone, a request made to Gendo from Yui. Gendo eventually learned about the existence of Limbo, as it was crucial to his knowledge of how to stop the Angels, and believed Yui was still alive somewhere down there. When it became apparent that the Angels would appear soon, SEELE sent Cobb and his team to assist Gendo and NERV, but with the ulterior motive of acting as spies.