Neon Genesis Evangelion Fan Fiction ❯ Interregnum ❯ The Arrival Pt. 1 ( Chapter 1 )

Interregnum

By TheLastWaltz

Rating: T

 Notes:          Neon Genesis Evangelion is the property of Hideaki Anno, King Records, Starchild, Studio Khara, et al. This a fan created work, and I do not intend to make any money from it. Should the involved parties request that I take it down, I will do so.

Chapter 1:    The Arrival

          Shinji awoke the next morning, his eyes fluttering as the early morning sun shone down on his face. He raised his hand to shield his face from the light as he used his other hand to push himself to his feet. He winced as he stretched, his muscles still sore from last night’s ordeal. A firm breeze blew against him, tousling his hair and causing his sleeves and slacks to flutter in the wind. As his eyes adjusted to the light, he looked up at the sky, tinged with the pinkish hues of sunrise while the wind brushed the clouds along. As Shinji returned his gaze to his surroundings, he stepped back in fear, his breath caught in his chest and his heart pounding against his sternum. Dotting the shoreline, and out into the surf were the vitrified remains of the Mass Production Eva Series. The giants were pinned to the ground by their lances, yet only their torsos and heads remained, their flesh gray and stone-hard. It took a few moments, but Shinji finally calmed down once he realized that the units were no longer capable of regeneration or self-activation. Still, just to be sure, Shinji picked up the largest piece of concrete he could reliably throw, and hurled it at the closest MP Eva with a loud grunt. The rock struck the fossilized being in the chest with a thud, before falling into the sea with a red splash. The creature simply remained as it was, its jaws pointed skyward. Shinji let out a slow exhale of relief, then turned away and proceeded up the slope of the beach until he stepped onto the pavement.

          In the light of the morning, Shinji walked along the beachfront road, noting the extensive damage. Windows and doors had been blown apart, and some buildings had been outright leveled or looked on the verge of collapse. Shinji stopped suddenly as his stomach growled, placing his hand on it in embarrassment. Of course, he realized, food was going to become an issue. While he lived, he was going to have to eat...and drink. Food and water were two of the basic tenets of survival, along with shelter. With that in mind, Shinji crossed the street, and started looking through the destroyed windows and doors for a shop that might have what he needed. Roughly a half-hour later, Shinji came across a convenience store. The door was barred by a security gate that was bent against its frame and refused to budge no matter how hard Shinji shook it. Sighing, Shinji took a step back and looked at the window, which was broken, but jagged. He’d really wanted to avoid going in that way, due to the possibility of getting cut. The last thing he’d wanted to do was die of blood loss after having survived the apocalypse. Still, he did need to eat, so he steeled himself and walked over to the window, kicking out some of the larger shards on the bottom, then crouching down under the top frame, stepping forward into the store. The soles of his shoes crunched on dirt, leaves, and the tattered remains of signs, displays and sales banners that once hung from the ceiling.

          The sunlight only illuminated the first foot of the store’s interior, so the further Shinji proceeded, the darker it got. Also, the further Shinji got, the worse the smell became. Following the stench to its source, Shinji fumbled for the handle to one of the cases, pulling it open only to be confronted by an odor that caused him to stagger backwards, coughing. A package fell out of it and landed at Shinji’s feet. Gingerly, Shinji crouched down, picking it up with the tips of his fingers and carrying it back to the front of the store, where he could read the label in the light. Cheese. Of course, Shinji reasoned. The stench was coming from the dairy case. The package was warm in his hands, causing Shinji to wonder exactly how long he’d been gone. Normally refrigerated cases were insulated to prevent food from spoiling in case of short-term power loss, but for the dairy to turn would take at least a few days. Factoring in the refrigeration, it had to have been at least a week. Shinji was shaken by the revelation, but pushed it aside as he tossed the cheese to the side, wiping his hands on his slacks.

          Curiosity sated, he now resumed trying to sate his hunger. He maneuvered through the aisles in the dark, until he reached the cash register. Hanging there on a swivel display were some small packages printed in glow in the dark ink. Shinji pulled one off and read it before hastily tearing it open. Now in his hand lay a medium length glowstick. He snapped the stick in the middle and shook it vigorously until the light reached its full strength. Exhaling slowly, Shinji turned around and began to browse the aisles slowly. Eventually, he happened upon a box of granola bars and picked it up, flipping the box over to read the expiration date. Luckily, it was well early of that date so he opened the box and pulled out one of the bars, unwrapping it and taking a bite. He gave it a few experimental chews before deciding that it was finally safe to eat, and finishing the bar in a few more bites. He tucked the box under his arm and deposited it on the front counter in front of the register. He then walked over to one of the refrigerators and opened it, pulling out a small bottle of lukewarm water before twisting the cap off and taking a deep swig. Shinji exhaled loudly, glad to finally be able to quench his thirst and ease the dryness in the back of his throat. He finished the bottle and tossed it in the recycle bin at the front of the store. He chuckled softly, realizing that even the end of the world couldn’t break some habits. After that, he moved to the next cooler and pulled out two six packs of bottles, taking them to the register.

          Shinji resumed his browsing, from aisle to aisle, grabbing things off the shelves that his common sense dictated might assist in his survival. Contrary to Asuka’s opinion of him, he wasn’t a total idiot. He might lack more comprehensive survival skills training, but he knew that he needed water, food, and shelter at least. Cans of soup, firewood, matches, newspapers, a tarp, some thick nylon rope, a flashlight, and several packs of batteries found their way to the register. As Shinji passed the outermost aisle, he saw a door on the wall with a sign that reminded him of another bodily urge. Hurriedly, he stepped into the restroom and locked the door behind him. He chuckled darkly as he realized that he still needed privacy in the restroom, despite being the last man on earth. Shinji flushed the toilet, scowling as it refused to fill back up. Another indicator of how long he’d been gone, the water pressure had entirely diminished. Heading back out to the store, Shinji pulled a few bottles of hand sanitizer and antibacterial hand wipes off the shelves. He walked back to the register and piled the items there along with the others. He then made his way back to the broken window and sighed. No way he was going to carry everything through that. He turned away and decided to see if there was another way out.

          He tried the first door marked for employees only, jiggling the doorknob and finding it locked. He stepped behind the counter and started rifling through the drawers, finding nothing in the first two. He yanked open the third drawer and found a set of keys on a canvas strap along with a box cutter. Shinji took the keys and returned to the locked door. To his surprise, the key fit, and the lock turned without hesitation. Shinji pushed the door open and found nothing but a dark office with a safe in the corner. Sighing, he closed the door and moved on to the next door, opening that one with just as much ease as the first. Luckily for him, this door led to the loading area, with two doors set into the rear wall. One door was a regular safety door with a push bar, and the other was a large roll-up door designed for off-loading delivery trucks. The light in his hand began to flicker, causing Shinji to shake the stick and smack it against the palm of his hand. Shinji walked over to the safety door and pushed it open, letting the midday light into the warehouse. He dropped the stick into the gap, blocking the door open just enough that it wouldn’t close, as he stepped outside and found a cinder block in the back parking lot. He then carried the brick to the door and pulled it open fully, using the much heavier object to keep the door open wide.

          He noticed a row of shopping carts chained to one of the walls and walked over to it. Fishing out the strap of keys from his pocket, he tried the various keys on the padlock holding the carts to the wall. After a few minutes, the chain released and Shinji withdrew a cart from the column, wheeling it into the store and over some of the debris littering the floor. He parked the cart in front of the register and began loading his items into it. Shinji noted with some enthusiasm, however, that the cart now allowed him to take even more items, so he rolled into the aisles once more, picking up whatever first-aid items weren’t damaged. Soon after, his cart was filled with hydrogen peroxide, gauze, bandages, aspirin, and other medications. If Shinji needed anything stronger, he would need to find a store with a pharmacy. With that done. Shinji finally turned the cart around and exited the store, passing into the back room once more. He steered the cart outside and into the midday sun, squinting as the sudden brightness assaulted his blue eyes. He then maneuvered the cart down the short three steps down to the parking lot, wincing as the bouncing jostled the objects inside. Once he and the cart were safely on the ground, he steered the cart around the corner and back onto the street, heading to an area he remembered having an entrance to an emergency shelter.

          Pushing the cart, Shinji rounded a corner, then into an alley. Narrow shafts of sunlight radiated down from above, the humidity growing worse as the day progressed, his clothes sticking to his skin. Finally, Shinji reached the end of the alley. In front of him was a sliding door that would normally be opened by a key card. But without power, the door could only be opened manually by means of a crank. Sighing, Shinji was reminded of the time Rei, Asuka, and he had to make their way into NERV with no power. Ruefully, Shinji rubbed his chin where Asuka had kicked him when the three of them were climbing through NERV’s air ducts. Shaking the memories off, he opened the panel covering the crank and pulled the crank’s handle into position. He grunted as he began to apply his strength to the wheel, which rotated with considerable effort. The door was heavy, made to withstand catastrophic events, and painted an obscenely bright shade of orange, with yellow and black caution stripes on the bottom third of the door. Finally, the door was opened, and Shinji unpacked his flashlight, shining it into the gaping, black maw of the staircase beyond. The stairs were too narrow and too steep to safely guide his cart down without risking serious injury, he realized. It was frustrating, but there was no way for him to avoid making multiple trips if he wanted everything in the cart to come down into the shelter with him.

          Hesitantly, Shinji took his first step into the pitch dark of the staircase, advancing slowly down three flights of stairs until he hit the bottom floor. Shinji passed through an open door to the right of the staircase, continuing onward, pushing against a wall of omnipresent and malevolent darkness that felt suffocating. No, not just the darkness felt heavy. The air itself felt thick enough to choke on, and smelled of copper. His heart pumped violently in his chest and his hair stood on end while sweat beaded on his forehead. He heard whispers, cries, and screams in his head as he stood fixed to the floor, immobilized by the fear surging through his body, penetrating to the bone. The concentrated sound of suffering rang through his mind as though it had been struck like a gong. The vibrations of terror roiled up from Shinji’s gut until it exploded from his mouth in a scream of primal terror that caused him to launch forward in a blind run of panic. His left hip clipped something hard and unyielding in mid-step, causing him to cant to one side, unbalancing him and sending him onto his back, where he landed in something sticky and wet that smelled like blood. Letting out another, shorter scream, he launched himself back onto his feet and out a door on the other side of the room. Slamming the door behind him, he slumped back against the wall and slid down to his feet, breathing heavily, as though he had outrun the Devil himself.

          He rose slowly, wincing as he placed his hand on his left hip. He shone the light around the hallway, the beam coming to rest on a sign pointing to an electrical room down the hall. Shinji followed the signs down the hall and entered the generator room where he saw three 1500 kilowatt generators. Passing the generators, he opened another door that led into the control room. There was a large panel that stretched almost the entire length of the back wall, dotted with tiny LEDs, all dark. Next to that panel was an open door-frame, with a staircase just beyond that led down. In the front of the room was a panel that took up two thirds of the length of the room, with a large picture window in front of it. Along the left wall were two panels, one marked as a transfer control panel, and the other panel painted bright red, designated for fire suppression. Secured to the right wall was a squat brown bookshelf, loaded with three-ring binders. Shinji walked over to the bookshelf and opened one of the binders. It looked like it was a collection of phone numbers. Extensions for within the shelter, and external numbers. Shinji’s eyes widened as he read through some of them: the JSSDF, NERV, mayor’s office, prefectural governor, all the way up to the prime minister’s office. By the end, Shinji was surprised the Emperor himself hadn’t been in there too. He placed the book back on the shelf, and withdrew another. Flipping through it, Shinji realized they were instructions to start the generators. They were surprisingly easy to understand, he thought. Mentally, he wondered if they were written that way deliberately, in case the engineers had been injured, and unable to activate the power supply themselves.

          After reading the directions a few times, Shinji decided to try starting one of the generators. He carried the binder in one hand and the flashlight in the other as he descended the final staircase into the fuel storage room. Shining the light around the room, he saw at least a dozen fuel tanks. To his left was an alcove containing three heavy valves, attached to three large pipes labeled ‘FUEL’, with arrows pointing in the direction of the flow. Shinji gripped one of the valves and pushed it into a vertical position. He then did the same for the next two pipes before facing the opposite end of the alcove where he came face to face with a large crank wheel. Here, the directions instructed Shinji to generate an electrical charge to prime the pumps and start feeding fuel to the generators before going back upstairs. He gripped the handle of the wheel and cranked it furiously, keeping an eye on the LED meter as it gradually rose from red, to yellow, to green. Once it topped out, Shinji pressed a red button to close the circuit and activate the pumps. A subtle hum echoed through the darkened shelter as Shinji heard the fuel gurgling through the pipes. He quickly exited the alcove and returned to the control room, where a touchscreen on the main panel was now brightly lit. Shinji stepped over to the panel and looked at it, flipping the binder open and setting it next to the panel. He quickly found the relevant page and looked back at the panel, which asked him a single question.

          [BEGIN PRIMARY ENG. SEQ. Y/N?] Exhaling deeply, Shinji pressed his index finger on the ‘Y’ pad. A short whine emanated from the first generator briefly before the motor ascended to full power. He looked back down at the panel and blinked as he saw another question.

          [ENGAGE GEN. CRANKSET Y/N?] After looking at the manual again, Shinji pressed Y once more. The panel shifted to a status screen, with all the bars operating firmly in the green. Following the binder’s guidance, he stepped back from that panel and turned towards the transfer control panel, whose own screen was now lit. Like the panel in the main bank of the room, it also asked Shinji a question.

          [UTILITY POWER INTERRUPTED. GEN. 1 ACTIVATED. DISCONNECT FROM UTILITY? Y/N?] Looking down at the binder, Shinji pressed Y. The screen flickered before proceeding to ask Shinji another question.

          [DISTRIBUTE GEN. 1 POWER TO LOAD. Y/N?] Sighing softly, he pressed Y once more. Seconds later, the panel responded. [GEN. 1 POWER NOW CONNECTED TO INT. SYSTEMS. POWER MUST BE RE-ENGAGED AT LOCAL BREAKERS FOR FULL DISTRIBUTION.] Exhaling in relief, Shinji flipped once more through the binder, but found nothing about the circuit breakers. Snapping the book closed, he realized it must be in one of the other binders. Walking over to the bookcase, Shinji set the binder back into its place before removing the one next to it and opening it. Surprisingly, this was exactly the one he was looking for. A map of the shelter and all the main electrical panels in it. Silently, Shinji gave thanks to the gods of organization as he stepped outside of the control room and walked to the wall to his left. He lifted the tab on a large metal panel set into the wall, the door swinging open to reveal the first circuit breaker panel. These were large industrial breakers, with a heavy handle attached to a half-dome switch. He pushed on the handle, forcing the breaker closed with a loud snap. The shelter seemed to hum, as if it were coming to life as he closed the other three breakers. He shut the panel and returned to the control room. The LED map on the back wall now shone brightly, illuminating the distribution of power throughout the shelter. Reaching out to a light switch on the wall, Shinji ticked it upwards. With a few clicks, the fluorescent light mounted on the ceiling blazed with light, causing Shinji to reach upward to shield his eyes, blinking as they adjusted to the light. For the first time in a long time, Shinji smiled. It might not be perfect, but for now, it was a good start.