Notus

"You-" Asuka said over the loudspeakers as Unit 02 was flung sideways towards Kyou's knife, her 5 minutes countdown starting. "-lost your chance to do this painlessly." As she completed the phrase, Asuka disconnected the Umbilical Cord from her EVA. Without the cord to hold her, she also gained forward momentum getting to Kyou way faster than the other girl could have expected - and feet first, applying a tremendously fast flying kick to Unit 19's stomach, landing on top of it.

Asuka felt the weight of Ahmed's pretty heavy Unit 18 pulling her down. Ah, so you're not completely clueless about close fights either. Good. She did know what he was trying to pull off though, and reacted promptly: releasing the arm around Ahmed's neck at the same as she yanked his umbilical cord with all her strenght from behind. As Unit 18 fell, it's cord snapped leaving a trail of sparks. Not only that, Asuka used the momentum from his fall and applied a kick worthy of a pro soccer player to Ahmed's ribs, cracking a bit of it's armour and sending him flying towards Satomi. Then it was her turn to fall - Unit 16 was back in the fight, apparently, and with a darn good hold of her umbilical cord. Unit 02 fell to the ground flat on it's back.

Ahmed did jump clear over the train, although the second part of his plan didn't work quite as he expected. Asuka reacted quickly and stepped, so all Ahmed did was kick the air where she had been - and leave his back wide open. She let go of the train - which flew towards Satomi and was promptly cut by her progressive knife - and grabbed Ahmed's umbilical cord with Unit 02 free hand, using it to pull him close enough for her to get the other arm around his EVAs neck - and put him between her and the charging Satomi as a shield.

The moment the other had to react to Asuka breaking through their lines passed - and then they realized why she had left her back wide open to them. She had grabbed the train and now Unit 02 turned around swinging it in an arc like a whip. Joints broke in some parts and wagons flew at them randomly, but in the end a section of the train long enough to hit the closer EVAs was still in her hand - and going straight against the charging Ahmed.

Ahmed noticed that Asuka's cord was visible, laying a bit to Beverly's left; Asuka landed facing the other way, near the train, and had yet to turn to face them. She apparently hadn't drawn her progressive knife yet, though it was hard to see what she had in hands as she hadn't turned towards them yet. Meanwhile, Satomi realized they also only had their progressive knifes as weapons, meaning this would probably be a close quarters fight - and Asuka obviously had an edge over them on mobility

Not bad. Asuka thought as the children succesfuly activated their EVAs AT fields and started maneuvering to intercept her charge. But not good enough! When Beverly tried her sliding kick, Unit 02's feet left the ground and, for a moment it seemed that the kick had worked. However, it soon became clear that Asuka had jumped right before the impact, twisting her EVA's body in the air like an acrobat. The huge red Evangelion actually did half a somersault in the air, used Beverly's EVA head as a support point to get more impulse with it's arms and then flew once more - landing on it's feet behind the line of opposing Evangelions - and over Beverly's umbilical cord, crushing it.

You have no idea. Asuka thought while her smirk evolved into a defiant looking smile. "Humpf. I'm in, but don't come crying to me later." She said, and then turned off the video call with the other EVAs. She'd use the loudspeaker from now on if she wanted to talk to them. "Ready or not, here I go!" She said, while EVA 02 uncrossed it's arms. And then she ran right towards them, each stride of the Evangelion's powerful legs sending the huge mass of the giant forward with unbelievable speed for something that size. It was instantly clear that something was changed from their fight with the Angel, and Unit 02 moved in a much more fluid and powerful way than what the other pilots had previously seen. Suddenly what had looked like a safe distance didn't seem to be enough at all, and that crimson monster would cross the space separating them almost literally in the blink of an eye.

(Battle Theme for this one) Once all the pilots were ready inside their plugs, Asuka started the simulation. The weird initial feeling of synchronizing with the EVAs was there and, once that was over, a realistic view of a city in ruins was before them. Four of them were in an open area that should have one day been a very wide avenue. Asuka's red, four eyed EVA 02 was standing facing them with it's arms crossed a few blocks away. There were trucks and cars laying abandoned in the streets, and a train was stopped in a station nearby, probably never to move. It felt like a true ghost town for some reason. "Welcome to Tokyo-3. This is a field I like training in a lot, so I thought I'd share it with you first." Asuka's voice sounded in everyone's cockpits while her smirking face was shown to them in the video call mode. Unit 02 uncrossed one of it's arms and lifted a finger in a gesture for them to pay attention. "I'll tell you five things before we start. One: don't forget to deploy your AT fields; Two: if your power cable is damaged you'll only have 5 minutes of internal battery to use; Three: you have your progressive knifes in your shoulder plates, just reach for it if you want to slice something; Four: I'm your opponent today; and Five: You will lose. Ready?"

"Alright, so if there's nothing else I'll get them to the training grounds." She said, getting up and then answering the other pilots without as much as waiting for a reply from the Admiral. "After that you can go spend the rest of your time until the mission starts doing whatever you want, deal?" Adalard raised an eyebrow, but otherwise didn't complain about the way Asuka took the meeting's reins from him. "Alright. Be sure to check your communicators often, we will contact you through them if we need you. And if you need anything, just ask Dr. Neummann and we will take care of whatever it is. You're dismissed." ... "You know I'm against this, Adalard." Dr. Hashimoto told the Admiral after the children and the shrink had left. Asuka had practically dragged the kids out, leaving the room ahead of them without looking back (and thus forcing everyone to follow her as quickly as they could). Dr.Neummann was about to follow them too, but Adalard told her to leave the training to Asuka and go back to her duties - there was still a lot of injured people to tend to, after all. "I don't see any problem, Daisuke." The Admiral answered. "I don't trust her, that's the problem. She was not with us from the start in this, and now we're leaving the most important valuable assets we have in her power. What if she starts putting ideas we don't need in their heads?" "You're worrying too much about this, Daisuke, even for your standards." He said. "Alma may have come to know about the EVAs only recently, but she is with NERV for a long time and knows how things work. I'm not an expert, but I think the risks of mental breakdown caused by Angels are bigger than those caused by a psychologist playing their mother." "..." "If she proves to be a nuisance we'll get her out of the way, alright? But cut her some slack for now, for God's sake. You're being more paranoic than usual, old friend, and honestly that's tiresome even for me." ... Despite what Dr. Hashimoto thought, Asuka did look back after she left the room - and slowed her pace (a bit) so the others could catch up. Of course, she did her best so they wouldn't notice how considerate she was being with them. "Ok, so answering Ranga's question" she said after everyone was closer. "Today I'm going to show you the gym, the shooting stands and the dojo. We'll be using that to train our bodies, martial arts, ranged and melee weapon handling. But before that, I'll teach you what you can do when you master your EVAs, so you can have an idea of how much you have to work if you want to really help in the battlefield." She showed the facilities she mentioned first - all close by one another in one side of the EVA hangar, small, but enough for their numbers. She explained they could use it anytime if they wanted to do extra training, including using the fake guns and weapons in the stand and the dojo - which were extremely realistic, though non-letal, versions of the real ones. From rifles to pistols, swords to war hammers, they had a lot to choose from. Finally, she led them to change into their plugsuits - the same kind of latex-like clothes she was using when they met her three days before, but each matching their EVA's colours - and the to were their EVAs entry plugs were stored in standby. "Ok then, let's get to it." She said, entering her own plug. "Our plugs are connected to a simulator, so we won't be actually moving our EVAs. The system can generate various types of Angels and battlefields based on what we have encountered so far, so we have a lot of combinations to practice in. Each Angel fights in a unique way, so I want you to focus on defeating the enemy in the most effective way and, for that, you must pay attention in how they fight, figure out weak points, think of a strategy and don't get killed while you're thinking about all that. Also..." She smirked as she reached for her plug's door. "Satomi's dad was kind enough to make the simulator very realistic regarding sync. Just so you know who to blame if you want to curse at someone for the pain. That's what I usually do." And with those 'encouraging' words, she closed the door.

"Yes" Dr. Hashimoto answered in an irritated tone. "And that is why I'm still of a mind to keep you children with the military, so that you don't end 'out of comission' by mistake. So try to be careful and prove me wrong, or Dr. Neummann won't be playing babysitter for too long." Alma kept a neutral voice and didn't change the pressure on Kyou's hand, but she looked at Satomi's father almost immediately. "That was... A bit uncalled for, Daisuke. I think we already went through that, and the children weren't put in any situation that might change that decision. Or am I wrong?" Before Dr. Hashimoto could answer though, Asuka intervened. "Look, the last thing we need now is you kids and 'adults' bickering over stuff like that. Can we get a move on and start training? I believe that was supposed to be the priority after all." That, coming from her, had the surprising effect of stopping Daisuke from answering. After an awkward moment of silence, Admiral Adalard took over "So, are you ready to start training?"

The hostel I stayed in was pretty well located in the center, so I walked a lot in that area ( Alfama, Chiado, Praça do Comércio, Bairro Alto, Fundação Gulbenkian...). Then I spent a day in Belém seeing the tower, the Monument of the Discoveries, Jerônimos Church, the Maritime Museum and the MAAT (and Pastel de Belém). Aand finally went to Sintra on the last day for the Quinta da Regaleira and the Moorish Castle trail. That's a pretty simplified version though, as Lisbon had so much beauty in every corner! Since I can't upload many pictures in the post, here's a Instagram link: Right now I'm in Aveiro, also loving the city! Already saw the saltworks, the port and the beaches on Costa Nova.

Naaaah, it's no problem. I like to travel without much of a plan and discover things on the way! As for updates, I've enjoyed 4 days in Lisbon and now I'm in Aveiro.

"That's because of technicalities you wouldn't understand." Dr. Hashimoto answered. "But, to put it simply, once the system is set to one person it's almost impossible to break the link and set it to another pilot."

"Right, we didn't have the time to explain about the technicalities of the EVAs yet. You'll have a more detailed explanation later on, but for now I can answer that, without an external power source, they can only operate by 5 minutes. As for weaponry, we'll be using the standard equipment - rifle and progressive knife - at first, and our dev team will analyze your training footage and work on weapons optimized for you fighting style." Admiral Sauer explained. This time Dr. Hashimoto was the one to answer. "Our contact with the ship will be pretty limited actually, since she'll be in orbit and we don't have a sattelite network here. It'll depend on our position relative to the planet, so communication will only work on certain times of the day. We can also ask for supplies, parts and extra medical aid to be delivered by shuttle, but that would spend even more fuel and should only be done in extreme cases." He said with a neutral voice. "Now that I'm personally in charge of our probes we'll have around 90% chance of detecting Angels over an hour before they appear, so enough time to either change course or prepare the EVAs for combat. The mission will be over when we have enough fuel for another landing." While the two men talked, Alma noticed Kyou's reaction and, being right beside her, gently held her hand. That was a lot to take in for everyone, but she seemed to be specially fragile compared to the others. Adalard grinned. "It's good to know you've got that much fighting spirit, Miss Beverly. Asuka will show you all to the training area after we're done here, so please be patient until them."

Adalard was honestly surprised by how focused on the mission Ahmed was. He expected him and Kyou to be more shaken after what happened to their family, so the boy's rational approach to piloting the EVA again was a relief. "Good questions mr.Ahmed. You'll be riding in the EVA transport to allow for quick deployement in case of need, as piloting them all the way to the extraction area would put too much of a strain on you. We do have all the apparatus to carry the Evangelion units along with us but, that said, going back to the ship is another story. We do have the means to do it, but should keep that to a minimum so that the tenders have enough fuel to carry the fuel - and us - aboard later." "As for our departure, that would be tomorrow just after dawn. Today you'll begin your training and then I suggest you spend some time with your families. Tell them you volunteered to help in the research or medical teams and try to make them at ease. I promise I'll give my best to ensure that you return to them safe, sound and soon."

Hello everyone! So, I'm going to Europe tomorrow for a backpacking trip and I'd like to ask you guys from the Old Continent for suggestions of places I should visit! I'll also try to update this thread with some pictures and impressions of the places I end up visiting. First up is Lisbon!

"Yes, yes and also yes." Admiral Sauer answered Ahmed promptly. "There's no time to look for other sync compatible people for the EVAs, so we need you to pilot for us in this mission; we already have a rough idea of were to look for the components we need thanks to the data sent by the probes and, finally, we will have a well equiped maintenance team for the EVAs in the expedition as well, but since our resources will be a bit more limited than usual I advise you to avoid taking unnecessary risks." The man then gestured towards Asuka with his right hand. "That said, you'll all be regularly attending to pilot training with Asuka. It will consist in physical training, martial arts, shooting, tactics and simulated battles. Are you all following until now?"

Alma´s Battleground Apartment Asuka was taken by surprise - not by Beverly trying to pull her towel, she expected that - but by the girl´s speed in doing so. Uh, she might not be all that bad in a fight after all. That would have to wait for later though. Asuka calmly let Beverly take the towel, glancing over her shoulder for a bit. "Well if you´re all that eager to prove my point, be my guest." She said, entering the bathroom without even flinching. "Ah, you can leave the towel hanging in the doorknob after you´re done, thanks." The sound of the door closing behind Asuka was a relief to Alma, as she didn´t want to start the day pulling two fighting teens apart from each other in the middle of her apartment. The woman sighed, and then answered the question directed towards her. "Yes, Kyou dear. Though maybe you´d need to do something about that grease... Dr. Hashimoto will probably disapprove if we stain his precious panels and screens in the command center, don´t you think?" ... Evangelion Command Center Despite Daisuke's worries, Neummann and the children arrived right in time for the meeting. Once everyone took their seats in the wide room, their forming a crescent shape facing Adalard, the Admiral started speaking. "Thank you all for coming. First of all I'd like to offer my condolences to miss Kyou and mister Ahmed here. I heard of what happened with your parents and I'm deeply sorry for your loss." The big man stared earnestly into the kids eyes while he delivered those words, but soon afterwards he assumed a stern expression. "Unfortunately, as of now we don't have the luxury of time to grieve over our losses. I called this meeting to inform you of our colony's current situation and future plans." He then took a step sideways and pointed towards Satomi's father. "Daisuke will talk about the first part." Dr Hashimoto stood up and moved to the center of the semi-circle, not wasting any time. "Well, after our staff finished counting the casualties we suffered in the Angel's attack, it is pretty clear we can't risk many more deaths. Nearly a fifth of the settlement's population was wiped out by the Angel, which means we're not too far from a number that would likely generate genetic diseases due to inbreeding in the future." He paused for a moment and then kept going. "Our probe drones have been patrolling to the extremes of their range and we've confirmed that this world is indeed inhabited by more Angels, which would pose an obvious threat to our survival here." Admiral Sauer assumed again from there. "Due to that it is clear that we cannot settle in Canaan without a huge probability of facing extinction. We will retreat from the planet, put the Noah on the move again and look for a new home... Or so we'd like to say." "The thing is, the ship has no fuel for another landing - that's why we took so long probing the surface before bringing her down here. So even if we put everyone back into cryosleep and manage to find another suitable planet we wouldn't be able to land on it." He let the information sink in before continuing. Honestly, he had needed some time to process that when Daisuke told him about it - it seemed that they had hit a dead end, but they still had some cards to play. "So the new plan is: we'll put the Noah back in Canaan's orbit to keep it away from the Angels. While the ship waits there, an exploration team will remain on the surface and look for the components to make more fuel for her. Once they're done we'll use the ship's tenders to bring it aboard and then leave." "Daisuke and Alma, you'll provide me with part of your staff for the mission. I'll need the best within your teams, please bear in mind our survival depends on that. I'll command the ground troops personally to escort them and..." he turned towards the children "...we will bring the Evangelions along too, since there is a good chance that we might encounter Angels along the way."

Alma´s Apartment Asuka heard that from inside the room. When she was younger she would be really pissed off about that, but now that she had grown into a mature, centered version of herself... Well, some things never change. "Ha, as if you had anything on me in that department." The red head answered loud and clear from behind the door, regaining her composure and grabbing her clothes "Besides..." she added, while opening the door and gaining the corridor wearing a smirk and a towel, either forgetting or not caring at all about Ahmed´s presence in the place. "It´s quality over quantity, dear." She finished, stopping for a bit to put a hand on her hips and stare into Beverly´s eyes with a triumphant look. Alma watched with an amused smile as Asuka moved past Beverly towards the bathroom. These two sure are a handful to deal with. she thought just as Ranga asked her about what they should wear. "Yes sweetheart, your normal clothes are fine." Adalard had decided that the kids didn´t need formal clothing for their reunions - they were trying to keep their identity as pilots a secret, after all. "Uniforms are really unconfortable and, besides, you look sooo cute in your own clothing! It would be a shame to spoil that."

Alma´s Apartment And there it is Asuka thought to herself, containing a smirk. Provoking Beverly about that would be fun, but they had more pressing matters to attend to. Alma caught up to that before she could, though; the shrink giggled a bit at the situation before speaking. "Well, despite all that I agree with Beverly, it´s probably nothing. For starters I honestly doubt Angels could really infiltrate the human mind, and even if they could this would be too weak of an attack, don´t you think?" She then looked at her wrist watch and raised an eyebrow. "We can talk more about that later if you want to, but now I think it´s time we get ready for our meeting." Asuka rolled her eyes at the shrink´s first statement but didn´t bother to correct her about the Angel´s capabilities - the less Alma knew, the better for her. It was enough that Asuka herself was aware of the situation and, more than that, she didn´t think it was an Angel attack nor a regular dream but something else entirely. How did they dream about Rei if they don´t know her? If that girl - that thing - was really involved, then she´d have to take it seriously. "Right then, now I´m gonna take a bath and get changed, since someone is finally done with it. I´m blaming 'Sir Kay' if we´re late." She then got up and left the room without waiting for a reply. Satomi "Not really, I never had the time to." Daisuke answered, finishing his plate. There was a bit of awkward silence and he looked at the time in his computer´s screen. "Uhmn, I´d better change for the meeting. I wish Adalard heard me and changed to video calls, they waste far less time." He said, leaving the table straight to his room without any other words.

Alma's Apartment "...Yeah, right." Asuka answered the other girl. Sometimes Beverly could get on her nerves, but she had to admit that "Sir Kay" reminded her of herself, years ago - and that's why she could get what probably was a lie. "So all of us had the same dream and only you wad left out? Well, that might mean it was nothing after all... If it was everybody, maybe we could consider it a useful piece of information." She hoped her words would sink in Beverly's head. Meanwhile, Alma - who had gently returned Ahmed's hug - returned from the kitchen with the cup of coffee the boy had asked for. "I don't think you have to worry about that anyway, Asuka dear." She said, picking up in their conversation. " Shared dreams are a bit rare, but they do happen to people since way before any Angel was spotted. There are lots of theories that try to explain why it happens - from some kind of brain state sinc to it being an access to an subconcious information network - but what is for sure is that they don't have any confirmed prophetic properties." She said calmly. "Actually my graduation work was on that subject. It's a really interesting phenomenom, and more common than most people think. I can still check you guys out for any abnormalities if you want me to." Satomi "Indeed." Daisuke answered simply, not sure if he wanted to keep that awkward line of conversation. He then took a bite of his breakfast and added. "You cook better than her, though. We used to eat out so much for a reason."

Alma's Apartment Asuka turned in her chair to face Beverly as she entered the room. "Hey Beverly, Ahmed, you two had nightmares too, right?" She asked, waiting to see how they responded. "What was it about?" Satomi Busted. Great... Sometimes Daisuke was genuinelly surprised by Satomi's ability to read him. He stopped working for a moment and looked at his daughter preparing the breakfast. "You know, sometimes you sound just like your mother, Satomi." He said, not knowing exactly why he did so. It was pretty rare for the two of them to talk about his wife.

Alma's Apartment Asuka froze for a moment, a shiver running down her spine while she carefully considered her answer. She could lie in order to keep the girls from getting too scared, but if Satomi and Ahmed also dreamed the same thing then it would be for naught. "Y-yeah. My dream was exactly the same thing." Based on her previous experience with Angels, it was pretty likely that Ranga was right about the cause of her shared dream... But the presence of that girl in it might mean something more than that. "And yes, this could be some sort of mind attack by an Angel. I've s-" She stopped herself in time. "read about them being able to do that kind of stuff, but I think if that was the case they'd be more aggresive." Alma was done with the eggs by them, and brought the food to the table. Asuka thought for a moment if it was a bad thing that the shrink heard them talk about all of that but, before she could go down that train of thought, they heard someone knocking on the door and the woman went to answer it. "Ahmed! Good to see you! Will you join us for breakfast as well?" She asked upon seeing the boy. Satomi Daisuke's face assumed a guilty expression as Satomi asked him that. "I... No, not really." He answered the second question, hoping she would be happy with that and wouldn't make him assume that he hadn't slept at all. Better to change the subject "Could you make sure the other children are ready for the meeting? I'm afraid Dr. Neummann might be a bit... too kind to them. It would be bad if they overslept today."

Alma's apartment "Great! Then you can sit at the table with Ranga and Asuka. Beverly is taking a bath and should join us soon." Alma told her with a smile. The psychologist then headed into the kitchen and started preparing their meal. "Would you girls like scrambled eggs?" "It's fine by me." Asuka answered. She waited for Kyou to get closer and then greeted the girl with a wave.

"Yeah I´m fine, thanks." Asuka answered the younger girl while gently putting her hand aside. She wasn´t a fan of physical contact from people she barely knew, but it was getting harder and harder for her to get mad at Ranga, whatever the reason. Maybe it was because she was the youngest and more child like of the whole group, without all the teenager drama the others always brought into any conversation. "So you had a bad dream too uh? Well, if something like that Angel didn't scare us, nothing else would." She had a long story with Angel related nightmares (although not many as vivid as this) and so it wasn't a surprise for her that her roomate started to have her own. It didn´t even cross her mind it could be the same dream. The other people that Asuka spoke to in the last few days were, basically, Beverly and Ahmed. Although the former only brought to the table some verbal (and in that one case with Kyou, physical) altercations, the latter seemed to be focusing his grief in something useful, at least. He bothered her a whole day, but at least she discovered a way he could be useful for the team, if all that talk about fencing was true. And Kyou somewhat showed she wasn´t half bad in a fist fight too, so that wasn't a complete waste of time either. Now since Beverly beat her to the shower today (she was caught off guard this time), she headed for the dining room with Ranga and the shrink. After asking the same as Ranga for breakfast, she heard someone knocking on the door. It was Dr. Neummann who opened it. "Oh, Kyou! How are you doing, sweetie? Please come in, the girls are already up." Alma greeted the girl gently, closing the door after her. "Did you have breakfast already? Would you like to join us?" Satomi Daisuke was, as one might expect, already up and working furiously in his terminal. At least he had a cup of coffee in his hand and a pack of crackers on the desk near him, so Satomi wouldn´t have to worry about him passing out from malnutrition. "Good morning Satomi. We have a meeting with the Admiral in about two hours." He said, looking up from the screen for once. "Did you sleep well?"