The screens exploded into white light before fading into static. The Bridge shuddered, and Misato grabbed the back of Maya’s chair to steady herself. All systems went dead, and the red emergency lights winked on.

“What the hell just happened?” Misato asked, her face drenched with sweat.

“The transformers blew,” Aoba said, “Backups in six seconds.”

“Have we made contact with the SDF yet?”

“No,” Hyuga said, “Nor the Joint-UN Task Force.”

“Keep trying,” Misato said. “They have to stop Unit-03 at all cost.”

“If they can,” Cooper murmured. Misato bit her cheek, her heart pounding. The gamble with Unit-01 had not paid off, and now they were at the mercy of Unit-03’s rampage. The pitiful weapons of humanity were all that they had left. They had no choice but to try and halt the beast with what they had, what they could. It wouldn’t matter, but the last moments of humanity could not be resigned acceptance. A fury rose in Misato’s chest, overriding the terror and filling her muscles with cramping pain. This was how they would end, but it would be in fire and rage.

“Backups online,” Aoba said. The red lights were replaced with white, and the screens reactivated. Code drizzled across the monitors for a moment, and then….

“Jesus Christ!” Cooper gasped, standing up. Unit-01 and Unit-03 were standing and grappling, their AT Fields burning against each other and warping the air around them. Unit-01 had a hand shoved almost completely into Unit-03’s mouth, trying to wrench the lower jaw away while it’s other hand made a solid effort to peel away it’s opponent’s breastplate. The fingers were hooked all the way into the partition at the throat, and the arm strained. Unit-03 had Unit-01’s horn, wrenching and trying to yank the Eva’s head off while trying to strangle it with it’s other hand. Both Evas were giddily unaware of their own peril, lost in their futile attempts to harm their foes.

“What happen-?”

“Sync levels are at 70 percent and rising! She did it!” Maya squealed, throwing her hands up in excitement. She struck Misato hard in the nose, surprising the older woman, but only for a moment. Blinking and shaking her head, she hurried over to Hyuga’s console.

“Raise her now!” she demanded.

“Got it, got it…it looks like the comm locks have been deactivated,” he said helpfully. He tacked, and a small screen opened in the corner of the main monitor. Something that sounded like a girl was shrieking, but it was hard to tell if it was in pain, or rage, or fear, or joy…it was just lost, animal noise. The image was grainy, broken, and pixel-lated.

“What’s happening? Why can’t we get an image?” Misato demanded.

“Static discharge incoming!” Cooper chanted, as if to answer her question.

“All that buildup, combined with the AT Fields, it’s overloading basic systems,” Hyuga explained. He leaned over his microphone. “Second Child, respond!” No response. “She should be able to hear me.”

The shrieking continued. A great snap of steel and bone and tendons snapped over the loudspeakers as Unit-01 was able to break open Unit-03’s jaw. The injured Eva released the horn, and began striking down on Unit-01’s skull with pounding hammer fists. The slighter Eva crumbled under the blows, but stubborn held on to the jaw and breastplate. With a tearing, sucking noise, the breastplate came free, as well. Red, slimy tendrils clung to the vast piece of armor, and Unit-01 relinquished the jaw to grab the plate with both hands and rip it free.

Raising both arms above it’s head, Unit-03 thundered down on Unit-01, driving it to the earth. It clambered on top again, once more trying to pull the head loose. Unit-01 fought back, but it was in a position of disadvantage, stomach down and pinned from above.

“Raise the First Child,” Misato said.

“We haven’t…we’ve trie-”

“Try again! Do it now!” Misato demanded. Aoba tacked at his keyboard, and the voice line opened. Misato grimaced; they were still locked out in terms of a visual. She swallowed, and leaned over the microphone.

“First Child, Unit-01 is engaged with the Angel, but they need your help. You are the only other Eva on the field. Move to assist, now.” Silence. “First Child, do you acknowledge?” Still no response.

She grit her teeth. Rei had gone silent since her panic attack, and was now ignoring all communications. Misato knew the girl heard her; the line was open. She was silent, though. Silent and stubborn. The Major glanced up at the command chair, at the inscrutable and silent Commander. Just sit up there, say nothing. That’s a big help.

Misato closed her eyes, and spoke softly into the microphone. “It’s not your fault, Rei. You panicked, and you couldn’t help that. It’s not your fault, but what you are doing right now is. Asuka is fighting for her life. And Shinji’s. And you can help. The longer you sit there and do nothing, the more likely they will die, and that will be your fault.

“I know you’re scared, I…I know. You need to act now, though. You’ve faced worse than this, go face it now. Come on, Rei.” There was no response. Still. Misato rubbed her eyes, and glanced back at the screen. Unit-01 was on it’s back, now, but still pinned. It pulled and ripped at the exposed muscles of Unit-03’s chest, gore dripping over it. Asuka continued to scream. Unit-03 continued to fight.

“Can we do damage to it now?” Cooper asked. “The exposed—”

“One AT Field alone would prevent any ordnance from doing damage, and there’s two at work right now.”

“Yeah, but they’ve focused so much of their AT Fields against each, they’ve left their flanks exposed. Maybe a lucky shot?”

“The back armor and tissue wouldn’t be that badly damaged. It’s the front we need to hit.”

“Unit-00’s moving.”

“What if we got an N2 to Unit-01? Push it through the field?” Hyuga suggested. Misato shrugged.

“It’s possible, we might—”

“I said Unit-00’s moving!” Aoba repeated, almost frantic. “And it’s going fast!” Secondary cameras relayed the image of the Eva, in a dead sprint, rounding the interior of the GeoFront as it moved behind Unit-03.

“Oh, good girl, go get ‘em,” Misato murmured, as Unit-00 completed the arch, bolted straight at the crouching Unit-03, and leapt onto it’s back. The Eva arched back in surprise as fingers dug deep into the Plug seating. The slime of the Angel once against swarmed up Unit-00’s arms, but it did not release it’s hold. It planted it’s feet and pulled.

Unit-03 jerked back, trying to face it’s new attacker, but Unit-01 followed. It looped it’s arms around Unit-03’s head, clinching and dragging it close. The enemy Eva seemed to panic, trying desperately break the clinch. Still, Unit-00 pulled, and strained, and still, Unit-01 gripped tightly.

And then, the Plug was free.

Clinging particulates of the slimy Angel tried to retain the Plug, but as it cleared the seating, all that remained on Unit-00’s arms and the Plug itself seemed to whither into a cloud of fine sand and dissipate. Unit-03 shrieked, and seemed to spasm. Unit-00 fell away, rolling backwards as it curled protectively around the Plug. Unit-o1 pressed the attack, digging into the stricken Eva like a badger. Great sheets of flesh, and then arm, flew away.

“I’ve got him!” Rei’s voice called over the net. Misato grabbed Aoba’s mic.

“I saw it! Great job, Rei, great job!” Her words became liquid, and she coughed as she sprayed a flicker of red across Aoba’s workstation. He whined as she pulled back, staring in dismay at the drops. Misato rubbed at her face.

“Damn it,” she murmured. Her nose was bleeding, likely from when Maya popped her.

“The Angel’s pattern is fluctuating. AT Field dropping…it’s dead, Major,” Maya said, relief oozing through her voice. She was blissfully unaware of the damage she had caused. Misato saw no need to enlighten her.

“Get Asuka to stop that,” Misato said, wiping at her face while the girl continued to shriek.

“Second Child, the Third Child is safe. The Angel is defeated, cease operations.” The shrieking continued, and the Angel was looking more and more like a greasy smear than a humanoid abomination. “Second Child, do you read?”

Misato was about to make a quip about luring Unit-01 back to it’s paddock with a giant slab of raw meat, but thought the better of it. She felt exhausted all of a sudden, the strain of the fear and anger dissipating and leaving her aching in it’s wake.

“The Angel is confirmed dead?” she asked.

“Very,” Maya nodded, turning to face. She baled. “Major, your face!”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m leaving the Bridge, I’ll let you finish the mop up. Lieutenant Ibuki has the Bridge,” she stated, turning and walking out while Hyuga continued to try and coax Asuka down. That was a damned near thing.

Damned near thing. She wiped at the blood, and once she was alone in the hallway, allowed herself to collapse on to her knees. Damned near thing. That was the closest, that had to be…the closest they had come yet. She shook her head.

Damned near thing.

Grendel being pieced back together was not that different from any of the other Eva’s being pieced back together. Shattered and warped armor was peeled away to allow tortured flesh to be bandaged and sculpted back into resilient form. If one was used to such a procedure, it took on an almost calming, dance-like atmosphere. The slow precision of teams working in unison to take apart, assess, re-mold, re-build, to make anew. It had a strange allure to it.

None of that seemed to help Rei.

She snuffled, burying her mouth into her folded arms as she slumped on the rail. Her feet dangled from the catwalk, high above the busy floor of the stable. Her face was wet, and her nose was running. She had stopped bawling, and was now resigned to the indignity of having seemingly everything on her face leaking of it’s own accord. She hated it. She didn’t know why she was crying, she didn’t know how to stop it, the feeling was a new and disturbingly unpleasant sensation for her, but it seemed that it was one she had all the time now. She hated crying, and in hating it, did it more. It was a sloppy cycle that she couldn’t break, and the more it ground down on her, the more felt like it would be best to maybe slip under the rail and meet that distant floor.

And yet, she didn’t. She knew it would be pointless, and that she would be back in this spot one way or another. She can always be replaced, and yet, it wasn’t entirely a replacement, was it? It would still be her, in a way, and that would make the whole exercise in self-destruction futile. She was robbed even of that freedom, for what it was worth.

She snrked, and blinked slowly. She felt the catwalk shudder, and knew someone had mounted it. They were walking towards her, but she ignored them. She didn’t especially care they were here, and continued to stare at the Evangelion, and calculating the time it would take for a body to fall from the catwalk to the floor.

The intruder stopped next to her, and she decided whoever it was wanted to say something to her. She ignored them, and willed them to go away. The catwalk shuddered some more, and to her surprise, she realized the intruder was taking the spot next to her, standing and leaning on the rail.

Slowly, Rei’s eyes scanned to the right. She saw brown boots, and camouflaged pants. Her eyes continued up, and she was surprised to see that the American commander was leaning on the rail, studying the Eva.

“First Child,” he said quietly, greeting her. She said nothing, and resumed her watch of the Eva. For a while, the commander said nothing, either. They both simply stared at the Eva, and Rei considered slipping under the rail. What would he do? Would he try to catch her? Would he stare in surprise?
Would he do nothing at all? Before she could put the theory to the test, the Major spoke.

“I bet you have a lot rattling around up here.” She looked at him, confused and surprised by the words. He glanced down. “Up here,” he repeated, tapping his head. “Am I right?” She looked away, refusing to answer. Ennis nodded. “That’s fine,” he said, “You don’t have to say anything. Is it okay if I talk, for a bit?” She shifted on her seat, and shrugged.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” the Major said. “If I…had run from a fight…I would probably be thinking of doing a lot of things that I shouldn’t be thinking of,” the Major noted. Rei held her stubborn silence. “I don’t blame you for that, and anyone who does is being needlessly cruel. Every soldier runs from a fight, at least once. No one is invincible.”

That did not comfort Rei in the least. It wasn’t about invincibility, she knew she wasn’t invincible. Even the cold comfort of quasi-rebirth didn’t detract from that. What she was, she had never felt before in her life. This desire to hide, to be as tiny as possible. An almost hot, heavy sense of sinking in reality, a type of self-loathing she had never truly felt before.

This must be shame. It had to be. She had never felt shame before, but that’s what this was now. She was ashamed of herself, of panicking, and running, and leaving her friends to fend for themselves. She was ashamed of her cowardice, ashamed of her failure. So much failure.

“I won’t pretend to understand,” Ennis said. “I don’t fight these things the same way you do. I can’t judge. I do know shame, though. I’ve felt that, I’ve dealt with that. I’ve done things I wish I hadn’t, because I was too weak to do otherwise, and I’ve been judged for them. I’ve judged myself for them. So…if it’s all right, I’m just gonna…give you some perspective, because I think this is new for you.

“Here’s the thing: you ran. That happened, I know you wish you could take it back…you can’t. It’s done, and that’s all there is to it, but…then you came back. Running away isn’t a shameful thing, it’s staying run off. You turned, you came back, you fought. You did that, and you saved that boy’s life. And I would think that you saved the Second Child’s life, too, because it sounds like once you pulled the Plug free, then that was the fight. That Angel could not continue to sustain itself without the Pilot to fuel it’s Core. You did very well.”

“I ran,” Rei murmured.

“And came back, and saved the day, stop moping!” Ennis said. “Go get some cake, or watch a movie, or work out. Go shed this cloud, because you don’t deserve it. There’s time for honest assessments later, and they will hurt…they’ll dig into you, and that is necessary. Right now, you did wrong, then you did right, and your right more than makes up for the wrong in my opinion. You don’t have to be perfect in war, just better than the enemy.”

“…I was better than the enemy?”

“Kid, you were the best. Sincerely. I don’t know…how you kids do it. Every day, fighting for us losers, against those…nightmares. You do it, though, and you don’t demand anything, and that’s…you did well. You’ve done well.”

That sounded dangerously like gratitude, and Rei thought that it was sincere. She didn’t know how to handle it, so she hid her face and bit her tongue. She wasn’t used to getting praise like that, from an adult, and it made her feel shy. It also made her feel happy, and somehow even more ashamed of her failure. Undeniably, though, it was a very nice thing to hear. And she decided that this American might not be a bad person, and might have some more good things to say.

“Should I still Pilot?”

“That’s not for me to answer.”

“Of course.”

“That’s for you to answer.”

“I’m sorry?”

Ennis gave her a gentle smirk, rocking lightly on his forearms as he rubbed his palms together in thought. “We both know,” he said, “That regardless of what the decision is, you will still be a Pilot of Unit-00. We have too few Evas to be picky, and we can barely make the Evas adapt to other Pilots. What the Second Child did today was…extraordinary, but also highly unlikely to succeed a second time. I know they’ll run the tests, but I have strong doubts, and I know you do, too.”

“I do.”

“So, you will probably still be the Pilot of Unit-00.” Rei resisted the urge to correct him; there was the real possibility that she, herself, might not. Certainly, Rei would always Pilot Unit-00. A Rei would. Maybe not this one. She resisted the temptation to speak that thought, though, and held her silence. She found she liked listening to Ennis. He was nice. “So,” Ennis continued, “That means the only one who can realistically decide whether it is right for you to Pilot is you. And there are times you need to be selfish. Putting yourself before others is…it’s not just laudable, it’s probably the highest ideal that humans can strive for. Selflessness is the embodiment of all that is good to be human, that’s what I think. I also think, however, that selflessness is damned useless when you’ve been broken so badly you can’t even stand up.

“There’s a fine line between being selfless and being stupid, is what I’m saying.” Rei felt a quirk in her, a hint of warmth, and it encouraged her.

“Are you saying I’m stupid?” she asked quietly.

“Very much,” Ennis said, not taking her bait. She smiled, despite herself, and rested her head against the rail.

“That was a rude thing to say,” Rei noted, more an observation than a protest.

“Sometimes the truth needs to be rude, kid,” Ennis said. Rei absorbed that little pearl of wisdom, and appreciated it for what it was. She knew nothing about tact, and she had a devil’s time learning it. She was getting better, she thought…but she could appreciate fact over tact any day. And, strangely…she didn’t feel better, but she didn’t feel bad, or as bad as she had before. She felt steady, is what it was. Grounded.

She stood up on the catwalk, and faced Ennis. He towered above her, but they looked at each other more as equals than adult and child.

“You’ve said some things I need to think about,” Rei said. “Thank you.”

“Of course.”

“You’re very nice.”

“Well…thank you,” he added.

“Why is that?”

“…pardon?”

“How is it that you got to be nice, when those I work for are not? What is it that you have that they don’t?”

“I think that’s unfair to Maj.—”

“I didn’t mean Maj. Katsuragi.”

“…ah.”

“…It’s nothing to concern yourself with. I was thinking out loud,” Rei mused. She bowed politely. “Have a pleasant day.”

“And you yourself,” Ennis said thoughtfully, nodding his head respectfully. The girl turned, and marched towards the opposite exit, leaving the American commander alone to ponder the mutilated Eva. He was still there when First Sergeant Delacroix marched down the catwalk to assume a like pose next to him.

“Master Sergeant Zeel said thirty-six hours. Given the musculature bonding, they can’t push it sooner.”

“I can live with that,” Ennis said.

“I thought…and stop me if I’m wrong, Rich…that what happened today…,” Delacroix teased out, leaning back.

“I am one-hundred percent on that wagon, Del,” Ennis said, jumping on the pause. “I don’t know if it’s because the Second Child is something else, of if these Evas are more complex than we give them credit for, but goddamn if that didn’t save our bacon.”

“A real deus ex machina, right?” Del asked. Ennis made a low, grumbling grunt, and pointedly looked off into space while Delacroix began to chuckle. “You see, because the Evas are god-like, right? And they’re machines, and what happened….”

“Del, you are as funny as gout,” Ennis said over the man. Delacroix would not stop being amused at his joke, and let the chuckle die off through a delighted grin. He sniffed.

“Which is it, then? Second Child or Evas?”

“All the Children are exceptional to one degree or another, but…here’s the thing, Del, I just had a talk with the First Child just now.”

“Holy hell.”

“I know.”

“I can only guess how that conversation went.”

“You might be surprised,” Ennis noted. “She’s probably the oddest duck out of them, and you know what?”

“Hmm?”

“She’s a teenage girl.”

“…I would have never guessed.”

“No, Del, I mean…aside from all the obvious oddities about her, physical and social, talking to her was no different than talking to my niece. She’s complicated, but only in the way teenage girls are complicated, you follow?”

“So far, but you’ll have to get to the finish line soon, because I’m losing the thread.”

“If the First—if Rei— is the most…unique of the Children…than they aren’t that special beyond being Pilots, unless there’s something I’m…totally missing.”

“Don’t name them,” Del warned, “Because if you name them, that means you own them, and if you own them, that’s veterinary bills, new furniture, they’ll chew up the furniture….”

“You’re a heartless bastard,” Ennis sighed.

“I…Rich, I have three kids. You think I’m being sarcastic, bro, I am dead serious here.”

“She’s a nice kid. They’re all nice kids, be nice.”

“Our mission doesn’t say be nice, bro. That being said, it has to be the Evas, right?”

“I’m guessing.”

“So, if that’s the case…we need to pass that up. We’ve already proved that an Eva can have multiple Pilots by slaving it, but it’s marginally effective. Evas react faster than humans, and the only reason our Eva can keep up is that we have some freaking weird human Piloting them.”

“Esta la verdad, compa,” Ennis agreed. “If we can build an Eva that doesn’t need a slave system….” The Major trailed off. There was another riddle in that, one much integral to things than simply the obvious point. That being, at the end of it, Ennis had no clue why the Evas had to be slaved or Piloted as they were in the first place. There was something he was missing, always something he was missing. They clearly weren’t lobotomized beasts, or they wouldn’t be so picky about who hopped in the Plug. It bothered him, not knowing, and it bothered him more what knowing might mean.

He shook the thought from his head. “Hey, Del,” He said.

“Sir?” Delacroix replied, his tone just half-way between attentive and non-committal.

“The First Child said I was a nice guy.”

“That’s wonderful to hear, sir,” the First Sergeant said in that same, flat tone.

“I am a nice guy,” Ennis said.

“You are a prince among men, sir,” the First Sergeant added.

“You’re goddamned right I am,” Ennis said fiercely, making a fist.

“All I’m saying, is that if you were to shift debugging the targeting system to the end of the simulations, you’d be done way faster than you’re finishing up now,” Cooper said, loudly chomping on dried peas caked in wasabi powder.

“And then when would back-up the sim results?” Maya said, exasperated, as the two strolled slowly down the corridor in the most meandering meander the two of them could manage.

“Dude, trust me, it’ll make your life so much easier. Everyone knows this.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Like, literally everyone in the world. When have I steered you wrong before, Woman-Lady? These peas are the best.” Cooper had not said a single word without a wad of crunched peas in his cheek. Every time he opened his mouth, more peas popped in.

“Yeah, they are. See, I know things! I know lots of things!”

“You know everything, dude,” Cooper agreed, holding up a wasabi covered hand. Without looking at it, Maya gave it a fierce high-five, or at least fierce for Maya. Despite the excellent wind up and clear force involved in the delivery, the actual high-five produced an almost underwhelming pat. The exuberance was all Cooper needed.

“Yeah!” he said, eating more peas.

“Yeah!” Maya agreed, adding a strut to her meander.

It was at that moment a shrieking Asuka barreled through the intersection, wearing a hospital gown. The pair stopped, a silence descending broken only by Cooper’s chewing.

“…Hey, Maya, was that someone we knew?” Cooper asked. As if to answer a completely different question, a posse of Nerv personnel dressed as orderlies chose that moment to sprint through the intersection.

“…Hey, Maya, was that someone we knew?” Cooper repeated. Maya didn’t answer, but began walking, then jogging, and then running around the corner. “Hey, Maya?” Cooper asked, still chewing. He began to toddle after her, not entirely running, but not wanting to run fast enough to distract from his eating. “Hey, Maya?” he repeated. “Maya?”

It didn’t take long for them to catch up to the group: the hall ended in an intersection, and the path Asuka had taken dead-ended into a maintenance nook. Asuka held the stool like a weapon, backed up and cornered by the orderlies who were trying to calm her down the same way one tries to coax a cat out of a tree, or encourage a wolverine not to eat a baby. Maya tried to make sense of the situation as Cooper finally caught up, punctuating every three steps with a rhythmic Hey, Maya?

“Hey, Ma…Is that Asuka? She looks more cranky than normal,” Cooper observed, crunching on the consonants. Maya ignored him, trying to process the scene in front of her. The orderlies, the girl, the stool…and there was Dr. Qyburn, one of the head medics. With an air-gun. It took a full second for her to recognize the air-gun, but as soon as it clicked in her head, Maya threw up her hands.

“Whoa!” she snapped. “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” She scurried over to Qyburn, Cooper following in mild curiosity as he continued to ponder the events unfolding around him. “Qyburn, what is, why, what are…why?”

“Ah! Lieutenant Ibuki!” Qyburn said in a tone at once friendly, exasperated, frazzled, and grateful. “How are you doing?”

“What is going on!?” Maya asked, pleading.

“Ah, well, the, ah, Second Child…who you see over there…escaped from her room after waking up, rather unexpectedly, I might add…with the most…phenomenal adrenal surge I have ever seen in a human being, much less a teenage girl. Knocked out two orderlies!” He smiled, as if that was impressive news. His eyes had a very tired look in them, however. “How about that?”

“Hey, Maya,” Cooper asked, diligently chewing on the wasabi peas. “Is that a gun?”

“She’s already bitten three other orderlies, not counting the two who are unconscious and almost certainly concussed. Or the one with the sprained wrist, or…there, there a few injuries, so, so, the point is, I’m not risking anyone else getting close, at the moment,” Qyburn said, his tone both defensive and panicked. He loaded a long, silver thing with an orange tuft into the tube and locked the bolt closed. He began pumping a lever under the barrel. Maya struggled to attach herself to the situation, feeling as though the whole thing was a strange dream that she couldn’t wake up from.

“Hang-hang on a second, for the love of God, I said stop!” Maya snapped, suddenly batting at the air-gun with two tiny hands and a clipboard. Qyburn grunted in surprise, holding up a hand to shield himself from the adorable assault. “Let me just…can I try something? Please? If that’s not too much trouble?”

“…be my guest,” the short man sighed in exasperation. Maya nodded in gratitude, and then turned towards the frantic Asuka.

“…Asuka-chan?” Maya said sweetly.

“I will eat your knees!” Asuka snarled, looking at a space somewhere above Maya’s head. Maya pondered a possible change in tact, when Cooper leaned over to her.

“Honestly, it sounds like she always does, I don’t know what the big deal is,” he said. Maya swatted his face with her clipboard, and he whined, rubbing his nose.

“Asuka…sweetie,” Maya tried again, “How you doing…buddy?”

“I have walked on the surface of suns you know nothing about!” Asuka growled, “I have seen the eternity that numbers cannot calculate!”

“…Zuul,” Cooper said. “That’s what she reminds me of. She’s Zuul. ‘There is no Asuka, there is only…no, no one else?” Thoroughly ignored, and unhappy about not getting attention, Cooper went back to his peas.

“Honey, you look a little off-kilter right now, so how about you put down the stool, and we go back to your room, and you get some rest, okay?” Maya said in her sweetest, most sugary voice. It did nothing to calm Asuka, but it did encourage no less than two of the orderlies to develop almost incurable crushes on Maya that would continue unabated for at least the next two months.

“I will go nowhere but where I am meant to be! I am a goddess!” Asuka roared, raising the stool threateningly above her head. “The rules don’t apply to me! I am immortal! I am eternal! I am invin-” There was a gentle sound, a thwit that somehow cut through the girl’s rage. Like magic, a slim, silver cylinder with a bright orange tuft of fuzz appeared in Asuka’s neck. Her rant immediately ended, replaced by high-pitched, steady wheeze as she froze in place.

“Oh, my God!” Cooper shrieked, throwing his peas into the air as his hands jerked up in front of his face. Maya was slower on the uptake, blinking for a few seconds before screaming in shock. Asuka gave a great, shuddering gasp, and slowly lowered the stool to the floor. She stumbled for a moment, reaching for the space where the dart was. She couldn’t quite find it, but her fingertips flicked at the orange fuzz.

“Oh, my God!” Cooper screamed again.

“Qyburn, what did you do!?” Maya screamed. The doctor waved her back.

“She’ll be fine, it’s just 800 CCs of Diprivan.”

“Oh, my God!” Cooper insisted.

“800 CCs of…what the hell is wrong with you, 800 CCs?” Maya screamed, beginning to panic.

“That’s a dart!” Cooper observed with increasing panic.

“Blaaaagh,” Asuka replied, stumbling in place for a moment as her face contorted itself through a series of very fascinating, slack-jawed expressions. Swiftly, Qyburn loaded a second dart.

“No, what are you doing!?” Maya bellowed, bodily placing herself between the doctor and the girl.

“She shrugged off 200 CCs! I’m not taking any chances!” the man said, steadily and frantically pumping the lever to compress air into the small gun’s pressure chamber.

“That’s a freaking dart!” Cooper insisted, completely lost to everything except the sight of Asuka, the dart, and her slow descent to the ground.

“Don’t shoot her again, you psychopath!” Maya snapped, trying to calculate what 1,000 CCs of would do in the body of a thirteen-year-old girl.

“Doc, I think-I think she’s had enough,” one of the orderlies observed, as Asuka sank to her knees. She raised a limp arm, trying to focus on the man who had just spoken.

“Maaaiiiiinnnnnnggggg,” was all that she offered, slowly tilting backwards until she was tipped over and staring at the ceiling, like she was performing the world’s drunkest limbo.

“Bring the stretcher,” Qyburn ordered.

“It’s in her neck!” Cooper added. No one replied to him as they hurried around the almost comatose girl, a full-sized stretcher trundling through the group to transport her. “It’s in her freaking neck!” he added. That was such an important detail, it needed to be repeated.

Qyburn pushed through the orderlies as they strapped her down, and checked the girl’s pulse, pupil dilation, and breathing. He nodded in satisfication as Maya and Cooper stared at him, aghast with horror.

“Finally calmed down, no apparent side effects, she’ll be resting comfortably, soon,” he said, happy.

“…You shot her! With a dart! Why, why-why, why w-w-would you DO…THAT!?” Cooper whined, glancing at Maya as if she could give him an answer.

“It’s fine, she’ll be fine. See?” Qyburn took the dart and pulled it out in a swift motion, revealing the shockingly large needle.

“Oh, my God!!” Cooper added, as Maya screamed and closed her eyes at the sight of the dart, grabbing her head with her hands protectively.

“You’re crazy! You’re a crazy mad doctor and I hate you!” Maya screamed. Cooper turned and began to walk, and then crawl, down the hallway, continually repeating Oh, my God every few feet.

“We’ll just get her back in her bed, and use some restraints. And some…tranquilizers in her drip. Maybe a few more guards. It’ll be fine. All good,” Qyburn said, rubbing his eyes under his glasses. Maya ignored him, sobbing to herself as she squatted down in despair. Cooper had fallen over, and was laying on his side in the hall. “All good!” Qyburn repeated, insistently. Quickly, he led the orderlies back down the hallway, abandoning the two lieutenants. They stayed there for three minutes, Maya simpering and Cooper lying on the floor. Aoba was the first to discover them, walking down the corridor Asuka could have taken to temporary freedom. He regarded Maya, the fallen peas, and the back of the prostrate Cooper. A half-minute went by before Cooper threw up a hand.

“Aoba! I know you’re there! Come comfort me!” Cooper demanded.

“…Nope, nope, nope,” Aoba muttered under his breath, turning and marching back the way he came.

“Aoba! Aoba!” Cooper whined. The hand flopped down to the ground. “I need peas, Aoba! Aoba!”