"Yes?" her voice came back calm, if not curious.

Shinji opened the door and entered the lab. It was a small, darkly lit one with a single console on the back of the right wall. "I need to speak with you about something, Miss Akagi."

"In that case, I think you want this off the record," Ritsuko replied with a sly smile and removed her NERV badge. "I'm just Ritsuko right now."

"Thank you, Ritsuko. Uh... If Ayanami were to have an... admirer, would that make anyone... nervous?" he asked slowly.

The question caught Ritsuko by complete surprise. Her eyebrows raised in mute shock and it took her a moment to digest the question. "Are you saying you have feelings for-"

"No, no! Not me!" Shinji said as fast his mouth would allow him.

"Well..." she looked down at the ground thoughtfully. Ikari would not like it if Rei might become disloyal to him. "It might. You still don't know exactly what she is, Shinji. If your father thought he might lose her loyalty, he would either kill her, or the person who had affections for her. Now I personally don't think she�s capable of emotion, but I've seen enough impossible things since you arrived that I'd be willing to call it a risk." "Why is her being human a risk?" Shinji asked plainly.

Ritsuko bowed her head, flashes of the experiments in which she'd participated coming to her mind in a rush. "Because a human is harder to control than a doll."

Shinji nodded, and Ritsuko believed that he actually did understand finally. He thanked her politely, and left the lab. Had it been even two months before, Ritsuko wouldn't have said a quarter of what she'd just revealed to Shinji, but times had changed.

Shinji rang the doorbell once and the door started to open. He stepped back, waited for it to finish, and looked up at Cirus, who was standing there. "Shinji? First Asuka, now you. Is Misato trying to get at me some how?" Cirus asked bluntly.

"Uh, no. Look... um, can I come in?" Shinji asked back.

Cirus stepped aside and waved the young man in. "So what is it that has you so panicked. You look like your Eva just went berserk again... with you in it," he added flatly.

Shinji grimaced at the reminder. "I doubt it. Look, Cirus, I think I noticed something about you, but I wasn't sure, and if I'm right you might be in trouble," he started abruptly.

Cirus raised an eyebrow above his dark glasses. "Go on."

"I'm not saying you do or anything, but if you were to... have feelings for Rei, beyond partnership, it might cause you trouble."

Cirus showed no sign of shock or surprise, but instead, just calm acknowledgment. "I see. Thank you for the warning, Shinji, but I doubt I'd get anywhere even if I did have feelings for her."

"I think you're right- not that you�re not-"

Cirus raised a hand to Shinji's quick fix of the possible insult to Cirus' abilities. "I know what you meant. If that's it, Shinji, I thank you, and I think you best get home. Looks like rain."

Shinji looked out the window and saw that Cirus was right. "Right, yes. See you later, Cirus," he replied as he stood up and headed for the door.

When the door closed Cirus timed his fist slamming into the wall to match it. "Idiot!"

"You're home late," Misato noted as Shinji walked into the kitchen.

"Yes, sorry."

Misato eyed Shinji over her beer. Upon seeing his expression she drained the can and set it down. "Something wrong, Shinji?" she asked in a softer, quieter tone.

"No, not at all, Miss Misato," he answered automatically.

She narrowed her eyes, but stood up, yawned, and waved at him with a smile. "G'night Shinji," she said and marched off to her room.

"Good night, Miss Misato," he replied after she'd gone.

Shinji didn't doubt his father's ability to kill innocent people anymore. After what he'd seen done to Toji he didn't doubt his father could do anything. Even if it cost him an Eva pilot, his father would kill whoever got in his way, and Shinji knew it. There seemed to be something about black Evas...

The next morning Rei and Cirus arrived at the main gate to Central Dogma at the same time. It was a simple coincidence, as they'd both walked up to the same narrow walkway of the long row.

"I beg your pardon, Miss Ayanami," Cirus said and stepped back, allowing her through first.

She looked at him for a brief moment before doing so. He followed a good five minutes later, when he was sure she was long gone. After his folly at the cage, he did not want to be too close to her.

Upon opening the gate he saw her standing there. He hid his surprise, and politely raised an eyebrow. "Waiting for someone, Miss Ayanami?" he asked.

She looked up at him, right in the eyes. He hadn't experienced a direct stare from someone in a long while, but her deep red eyes didn't seem to burn into his like most people's did. They just politely scanned the surface out of curiosity.

"Why did you wait so long to came through the gate?" she asked in her low delicate voice.

"It wouldn't accept my card for some reason," he answered. "May I ask why you were waiting?" he got back at her.

"I was curious," she answered and then turned and walked off.

Somehow he knew that she knew he'd lied. He gritted his teeth and proceeded on his way.

Asuka had been leaning over the railing looking down at one of the halls when she�d seen Rei come through. She always found the girl odd, so she tended to keep her in eyesight if she could. When Rei stopped and waited at the gate she grew more curious, and then when Cirus walked through and they spoke to each other she was shocked.

She spun around, and walked straight into Cirus. "Cirus?!"

"Saw that, did you?" he asked, stepping back from her politely.

"Saw what?" she asked back.

"Rei and I. I know you saw it. Asuka, it's not what you think. Don't worry about it," he explained, and then turned and walked off.

It calmed her emotions down, but now she was curious about what they had spoken. It took a great deal for Rei to speak first.

"That sounds like a very odd reason to deploy all four Evas," Cirus commented as Misato explained the next experiment to them.

Misato looked at him with a quiet glare, "This place hasn't been up to par lately, and we�re concerned that it might not be able to power all four Evas at once."

"As you wish, Major, but I still think its odd. Maya can't do a computer check of the power read outs?"

"Stop questioning my orders, Cirus," Misato answered sharply.

Cirus bowed his head.

"Now you four get to your Evas and launch," she ordered.

"Yes, ma'am," Cirus, Shinji, and Asuka replied.

Rei simply followed them to the locker room. The hatches closed, the plugs spun down with their hydraulic hissing, each Eva's plug-housing closed and slid back into place, and the four pilots were immersed in LCL as the systems started up.

"Prepare for launch!" Misato shouted.

"Yes, ma'am," Hyuga responded.

Units 14, 01, 00, and 02 each locked back into the launch-tracks on the large platforms supporting their feet. The hydraulic locks also engaged between the platforms and the launch mechanisms as the pathways for each Eva split open all the way up through the base.

"Launch!" Misato shouted over the comm-system.

Each Eva rocketed up through the base in turn, appearing above ground in a loose circle.

"Instructions?" Cirus asked back over the comm-system.

"Just stand there for now," Misato answered. She turned to Maya and nodded, who started tapping away at her keyboard.

"Hmmm, everything appears normal so far- Wait! Unit 00, disengage your power cord!" Maya shouted.

As Rei reached back to yank the power cord out, Misato asked Maya what was wrong. "Power surge. If she doesn't unplug herself, she could get very badly injured."

Cirus heard this over the comm, and walked over to Unit 00 just in case.

"The cord is stuck. I can not disengage it," Rei reported calmly.

"Then cut it off!" Misato shouted.

All four Evas saw the bolt of energy pass up the cord and stream rapidly towards Unit 00 itself. Unit 14 suddenly sprang a blade from its forearm and dove down, slicing the power cord apart just as the surge was getting to Unit 00's jack.

"Unit 14, explain yourself!" Commander Ikari's voice rang out over the comm-system.

Cirus raised an eyebrow at the order, but complied. "Unit 00 was given the choice to cut its power cord, but had no weapon to perform such a maneuver. To avoid more serious damage to both pilot and Eva, I manually disengaged the power cord. Did I act out of place?" Because, if I did, I don't care, he added to himself.

There was a pause and then: "Negative. Your action was allowed. Unit 00, return to base for repairs before your power runs out."

"Yes, sir," Rei replied. She let her eyes linger on Unit 14 for a moment before heading back to her launch pad.

Cirus quietly breathed a sigh of relief. At least his instincts had an excuse this time.

"The rest of you will stay out for another ten minutes to confirm our ability to activate three at a time. When Unit 00 is fixed we'll see if we fixed the problem," Misato explained.

"Confirmed," Cirus replied.

"Yes, Miss Misato," Shinji.

"Yes, ma'am," Asuka.

Unit 00 was placed inside its storage cage, the platforms and restraints sealing around it. The head tilted forward, the plug-housing rushed open, and the plug spun out with a soft rush. After the hatch opened, Rei hopped down from her entry plug, and found Ikari standing there.

"Did he try to damage Unit 00?" Ikari asked calmly.

"No, he did not," Rei answered with a brief shake her head.

"Are you sure?" he persisted.

"Yes," Rei reiterated.

"Very well," he replied, turning around to leave. He stopped and looked back at her over his shoulder. "Do you trust him?" he asked.

"Yes," Rei answered after a slight pause.

Ikari left without another word. After he'd been gone for a few minutes the other Eva units came down and started docking. When he could, Cirus hopped down from his entry plug, and walked around to Rei as she walked back to the locker room.

"Rei, did I get you involved in something?" he asked her quietly.

"No," she answered.

"Good. My apologies for disturbing you," he apologized with a bow of his head, and then separated from her.

Asuka watched this and narrowed her eyes. It was what she thought, and Cirus was very bad at hiding it. His quiet, but perpetual concern for Rei's well being was not exactly invisible. Asuka sighed, why did the quiet ones always get the good-looking men?