Chapter 49:
Noise

 

THE SOUND OF WAVES could be heard in the science and engineering division of Nerv Japan, crashing loudly then receding softly. The science floor was known as the place where a mob of mad scientists did their work. Maintenance crew rarely ventured there if they didn’t have to, and the rest of the personnel went through pains to avoid that floor entirely. The head of the division was notorious for her inflexibility, to the extent of refusing to implement something as innocent as a movie night.

“…”

These were the things that Ibuki Maya, chief of the science and engineering division, had heard spoken about her in the past as she walked this darkened hallway lined with airtight doors.

But now she heard the crashing of waves. She stopped and looked back. Perhaps it was only nerves. She sighed and was about to resume her course when she heard something else.

<<Even for Unit One this is…>>

A human voice!

<<The pilot is synchronizing too much. We can’t get a reading!>>

<<We don’t know how the battle with the mass-production Evas is developing outside, and some of our own special forces are still inside. There’s no reason to activate an unknown Eva in these circumstances.>>

<<We’ve been transported into Lilith’s Egg from God knows where. In any case, we’re already drowning in the stream, and a reed is as good as a log if it can get us out.>>

The unseen speakers carried out a strange conversation. She didn’t recognize the voices, but she faintly remembered their styles of speech. Maya followed the voices and stopped in front of the room they were coming from.

Wait, this is my room!

<<Second Impact-level energy output frozen like ice within a closed system… Impossible.>>

Maya recognized that voice. She banged on the door wheel before throwing it open. The voice had disoriented her to the point where she’d actually forgotten to call for backup.

“Who’s there?!”

The noise instantly disappeared. The host A.I. of Maya’s room greeted her, turning on the lights as she entered.

No one’s here…

But Maya noticed the flickering of her LCD drawing board and dashed toward it.

“What is this…?” A rough schematic had been drawn on it. Blueprints of some kind. The four fairings lined up next to each other hinted that it might be an Evangelion’s shoulder pylons. Words and diagrams had been scribbled on it from at least two sides, but there were no new entries on her usage log. There was a circle made up of many overlapping lines, as if drawn by an indecisive artist. On top of the circle were two Λ’s, which looked as if they’d been put there by mere force of habit. They looked like cat ears.

Maya drew a deep breath. She would get some sleep and then pursue the hard questions. Yes… Perhaps Toji knew who’d pulled this prank on her. This was her initial reaction.

She stepped back from the drawing board to look again at the diagram on the side when suddenly her files fell all over the floor. She finally addressed that person in the room.

“What do you expect me to do, Dr. Akagi?”

It was like observing the Second Impact. All energy would be unleashed during the final phases of the apocalypse and put an end to everything.

Most of the energy would be made up of photons, followed by a tidal wave of particles of every imaginable wavelength. Maya followed the diagram to its conclusion—a straight line to a black gate where everything converged.

“It’s as if time has stopped. The final second of the end. No…I doubt we would get even a second in the end.”