A Very Silly Fanfic Idea

[lavanya_six]

Here's something I wrote up on a lark. Not sure if I got the voices right, but whatever. I'm somewhat surprised no one's ever crossed over these two series.

So, valued readers, is it worth continuing?

Shinji Ikari stood in a deserted train station, dialing a green telephone.

Now this is hardly a unique occurrence in the grand scheme of things. If we counted the number of universes where a Shinji Ikari stood in a deserted train station, on this particular day, at the start of this particular sort of story, we'd run out of fingers and toes even if the denizens of several Earths pitched in on the counting. On Earth-13885-Apple there was once even an attempt by a certain multiversal scholar (well, grad student) to count the number of realities in which a Shinji Ikari dials this phone on this day. This particular grad student tried working out a system for sorting these realities by, say, the ones where Shinji mis-dials the number and has to start over, then further storing them by precisely how he mis-dials it and if (and what) Shinji swears when he realizes his error. Eventually our noble grad student threw up his hands in disgust when he realized he could just as easily get his degree by handing in a thesis paper he could copy from his own duplicate in a parallel reality where the grad student had chosen a more interesting and achievable topic of study.

BUT getting back on topic, though this whole train station scene wasn't in itself interesting (because, seriously, how many times have you read about it in fanfiction before your eyes bleed? an average of 320,205,021 times, according to that grad student's paper). No, what was interesting was who was standing next to Shinji Ikari  in that deserted train station.

"Bwah?" you say. "But you said it was deserted!"

Watch, I say.

"We're sorry, due to a special state of emergency no lines are currently available. This is a recording."

Shinji Ikari replaced the telephone in its cradle with a note of disgust. Checking his teacher's hand-me-down wristwatch he turned around, intent on walking around aimlessly for a bit while grousing about his lot in life, when he nearly collided with a towering black-robbed figure. "OH!" he cried. "I'm sorry, sir! I didn't see you!"

NICE DAY, ISN'T IT?

The soon-to-be Third Child blinked. Something was tickling his Sixth Sense, quite literally.

The black-robbed figure turned to face Shinji. The bright sunlight of the day cast a pitch black shadow across his hooded face. Shinji suspected he had a reason for keeping his hood up. The fact the stranger had a thin, very bony hand wrapped around a scythe was definitely a clue there.

"Um, yes?"

THERE ARE SO FEW OF THEM LEFT THAT ONE MUST TRY TO APPRECIATE EACH. TOO BAD ABOUT ALL THE WORK I HAVE TO DO TODAY. The stranger extended a long, bony (BONY NOT BONE! screamed Shinji's mind) finger towards a spot a little way down the street. I SUGGEST YOU STAND OVER THERE FOR NOW. IT WOULDN'T DO FOR YOU TO BE IMMOLATED BY THE VTOL THAT'S ABOUT TO CRASH IN HERE.

"Th-thanks?"

The black-robbed stranger shrugged. NO PROBLEM. OH, AND SAY HELLO TO THE CREEPY GIRL STANDING DOWN THE STREET FOR ME, WILL YOU? GOTTA RUN. TA.

Shinji blinked. The strange figure was gone in that instant. He looked around. Of the malnourished stranger there was no sign.

"...okay," he said to himself at last, not sure what or who precisely was 'okay' but it felt like the thing to say. So much so that he said it again. "Okay."

Shinji Ikari, not having anything better to do than wait, walked over to the spot designated by the black-robbed stranger.

-=-==--==-=--===-=--==-

"G-- damn it, I'm late! Why today of all days?!"

The driver cruised down the street at perilous speed with a disregard for anyone around him. Not there was anyone around him. Any sane person was either hunkered down in a civil defense shelter or behind the stick of a tank or attack VTOL.

'But not me', he thought darkly to herself. 'No, no. The Commander has to send me out on an errand during our first major operation! I swear, no matter who I work for they're always complete morons!'

Overhead, a squadron of jets streaked fast and low to the ground. They were head in the same direction as his car.

He said a rather nasty word.

Shifting gears, NERV's Operations Director drove faster towards the train station.

-=-==--==-=--===-=--==-

Shinji Ikari was becoming certain he needed to stop taking drugs. Or start taking them, he corrected himself, since he straighter than the straightest edge to begin with.

Black-robbed stranger with a scythe suddenly appearing and disappearing in a deserted train station? Okay.

Cute girl suddenly appearing and disappearing at the end of a deserted street? Sure, why not?

Shinji drew the line, however, at the giant green bony monster throwing down with the JSSDF air force.

Rule of three, people, it doesn't just apply to comedy.

"This is not happening. This is not happening. This is not happening. This is not happening. This is not happening."

Overhead, a heavily damaged VTOL spun out and fell to Earth (Earth being the train station where Shinji would have otherwise been standing if not for the black-robbed stranger). The aircraft exploded into a colorful, titanic fireball that would break the f/x budget of any modest action adventure television program.

Shinji, arms thrown up to protect himself from the blast, chanted, "This is not happening. This is not happening. This is--"

There was a squeal of tires and a rush of air smelling of burning rubber. A man shouted, "Oi! Kid! Get in the car!"

Shinji lowered his arms and looked to his left. There, in the middle of the burning street, was an antique looking car out of some foreign language film. The sight of the open-topped torpedo-like black car in the middle of a scene from a Kaiju movie was enough to shake Shinji from his fever.

The teen squinted. "This... is happening?"

"YES! NOW GET IN THE DAMNED CAR!"

Shinji did so. As soon as the door was shut the car burst to life and was hurtling down the car-strewn street, weaving its way around the parked cars dotting the road at a ferocious speed. Several minutes pasted before the car exited onto the empty highway out of the city. The car didn't slow, but neither did it speed up. Shinji suspected that it had always been going at top speed. "Okay."

The driver, whom Shinji hadn't paid any attention to in his delirium, said, "So you're okay?"

"Yeah. 'm okay."

"Thank G-- Lu--- whatever." He adjusted his sunglasses, then startled as a thought occurred to him. "Er, you ARE Shinji Ikari, right?"

"Yeah." Shinji added, the return of feeling to his arms and legs reinvigorating him. "I'm me."

The driver sighed in relief. "Wooo! That could have been bad for me."

"And for me."

"Well, yes, I suppose so." The dark-haired man, who Shinji suddenly realized was a foreigner, offered him a friendly hand. He continued to steer the car one-handed, barreling down the curving highway without looking. "Introductions are in order, young man."

"S-Shinji Ikari," he mumbled, taking the offered hand while fixating on the road. Shinji figured at least one of them should be looking at it. "Pleased to meet you, Mister---"

"Captain," corrected the dark-haired man, smiling. "The name's Captain Anthony J. Crowley."


-=-=-==--=-=-=-=-==--=-=

When the lights came on and revealed the giant purple mecha it was almost anti-climatic for Shinji Ikari. He felt pretty okay about that. After spending the morning being visited by two mysterious figures, rescued by a gaijin in an antique car, caught in the shockwave of an N2 explosion that didn't so much as muss said antique car, subjected to some form of noise Captain Crowley called 'Queen', learned that his father ran a secret paramilitary organization, saw a real live Geo-Front, and was introduced to a rather attractive blonde woman dressed in a skin-tight bathing suit.... well... why wouldn't a giant purple mecha be anti-climatic?

Sadly for Shinji, all that was just Act I of Episode 1 of a 26 episode TV Series.  

"My father built this?"

"Correct," proclaimed a spooky voice. Shinji looked up a saw a figure highlighted in an observation room above and behind the giant purple mecha. "It's been a while."

Shinji blinked. "Okay."

"We're moving out."

"Okay," said the teen automatically.

Captain Crowley grinned. "Great!" He turned to Shinji and gave the teen a friendly punch on the shoulder. "Try not to get smote, okay?"

"Oka--wait! WHAT?!"

"We have no other choice," said Doctor Akagi flatly. "Shinji, get inside it."

"HOLD ON A SECOND!" screamed the brown-haired teen, a note of hysteria creeping into his voice. "I'VE NEVER SEEN THIS THING BEFORE IN MY LIFE! AND NOW YOU WANT ME TO PILOT IT AGAINST THAT MONSTER?!"

"Again," said Commander Ikari from on high, "you are correct."

Shinji zoned out, lost. He listed side to side and, frankly, looked a bit pale.

Crowley coughed.

Suddenly a dark thought occurred to Shinji. All at once his vitality returned, along with a new desire to kick puppies and steal lollipops from babies. "No! NO!" He raised high a one-finger salute to his absentee father. "F*** you, old man!"

Gendo Ikari blinked.

"Shinji," said Crowley, touching the teen's shoulder. The dark-haired gaijin man crouched a bit and leveled his sunglasses with Shinji's brown eyes. "Look, we all get that the bearded man's a ruthless bastard who deserves to have his own balls served up to him on a silver platter--

"Ahem," said Ritsuko.

"Oh, you know it's true! For G--- Luc--- for Pete's sake, there's practically ominous Latin chanting every time he enters a room!" Crowley gestured towards the giant purple mecha. "But getting back on topic, you're the only person in the world who can pilot this Evangelion. You are literally the human race's last shot at killing that asshole Sachiel and preventing our species' extinction."

"Bwha?"

"The giant monster, Shinji. A little focussss would be helpful. I don't like to repeat exposition, okay?"

Shinji nodded.

Crowley smiled. There were far too many sharp teeth. "Great! So you'll do it?"

"No!"

Despite having his eyes completely hidden behind stylish black sunglasses, Crowley managed to (un)righteously glare at Shinji. The teen pissed himself a little. "Excuse me?"

"I-I said n-no." Shinji drew himself up, pulling himself out of defeated slump and into a full-on slouch. "No way. I can't do it!"

NERV's Operations Director stood up. "Fine! Be a selfish git! Destroy the world! It's not like there's anything people will miss about it! Like good wine or feeding the ducks or buggery or collecting musty old misprinted Bibles!"

Crowley's rant echoes through the vast Cage. No one said anything afterwards. Shinji Ikari simply stared at his feet.

The chamber trembled. Overhead, the electric lights shook in their encasings. In the distance there was a rumble like thunder.

"It's found us," declared Commander Ikari.

"Shinji," said Doctor Akagi, "we have no time."

Crowley ordered in a deep, commanding voice, "Young man, you WILL get inside and you WILL rise up to become a legend!"

"NO!" shouted back Shinji, body trembling. "After coming all this way, after this whole crazy day with disappearing black-robed men and antique cars and her," he pointed to Ritsuko Akagi, "in her skimpy swimsuit--"

"Skimpy?!" she cried.

"--there's NO WAY I can do this!"

Crowley blinked. "I'm not ssssure how Akagi's bathing suit requiressss the end of the world."

"It's a diving suit, damn it!"

"Whatever." He concentrated at Shinji, but then someTHING stepped between the two of them.

The Third Child blinked wildly, then gripped his forehead with a wince. "Ow! Ice cream headache."

Captain Crowley eyed the giant purple mecha to his right. Had anyone else just heard that growl? Down girl, he thought towards the giant purple mecha. No need to reach out and discorporate ol' Crowley. I'll leave the kid's head alone, okay?

The giant purple mecha said nothing that could be heard by either human or non-human ears. Crowley took that as a sign of tact approval.

"Shinji," called a new voice, "why did you come here?"

The not-quite Third Child whipped his head around. Crowley, Akagi, and several of the techs in the Eva Cage looked to the speaker as well. None of them saw a stranger, not even Shinji who had never 'met' the speaker in question.

"Y-you!" stammered Shinji. You're the disappearing girl from the street, the one the black-robbed guy told me about! "Who are you?!"

The fourteen year-old girl brushed a loose lock of hair out of her eyes. She only had one hand to do it with; her other arm was wrapped in a sling. A heavy bandage covered one of her eyes. The one uncovered eye was enough to send shivers down Shinji's spine.

Crowley didn't like the girl either, but he at least was used to her enough that he didn't flinch when that one eye passed over him.

"Ayanami!" said Doctor Akagi. "You should be in bed!"

"I don't intend to nap while the world ends," she said, walking forward towards Shinji with a slight limp. Nothing more was said while the girl closed the distance between the two teens.

Distantly, the scion of the Ikaris noted that the teen was pretty and certainly endowed for a girl her age. Her red eye and lavender hair were a bit off-putting, though.

Crowley cleared his throat. "Shinji, meet the pilot of Unit Zero, the First Child, Misato Ayanami."

"Charmed as ever, Captain." She stepped close to Shinji. There was little more than three feet between the two. Shinji tried not to stare at her crimson iris. Crowley, though, was more successful in finding something else to look at.

"Uh...."

"Shinji Ikari," said the First Child, "why did you come here? Was it to see your father? Did you honestly think he'd call you back after all these years for no reason?"

"I... I don't know," he said, not wanting to admit that's exactly what he'd hoped for.

The First Child stared at him. Shinji didn't think you could fit that much warmth and empathy into one eye. "You mustn't run away, Shinji. Not from your father, not from the people that need you, and most of all not from yourself." Misato Ayanami reached out with her good arm and took Shinji's nearest hand into her own. She gave it a light squeeze. "You have to do this, Shinji Ikari. You have to try because otherwise it's all over for the whole human race."

"I understand," he whispered, "but I don't think I can." I'll fail. I'll be the one who failed everyone.

"You don't believe in yourself," said Misato.

"..."

"Then believe in me, Shinji, who believes in you."

Captain Crowley gagged.

"I... I...." Shinji swallowed. "O-okay. I'll do it. I'll pilot it."

Misato let go of Shinji's hand. "Thank you," she said, brushing another errant lock of lavender hair out of her one working red eye.  
 

Comments

[blueinkedlines.livejournal.com]

D-did you really just cross over Evangelion, Discworld, and Good Omens? (And have it be awesome?)

...I think I'm in love. *fangirls*

[lavanyasix.livejournal.com]

Just a head's up. I added more after Shinji and Crowley's introduction to each other.

[timeywimeyball.livejournal.com]

I think I'm going to have to join in with the fangirling.

Because, damn- that's the sort of crossover idea I wish I could come up with.

Also, it's the sort of thing I want to read more and more of, too. Because I like this sort of thing, it seems.