Disclaimer – Don't ask cause I don't own it, if it's got a copyright on it, it isn't mine

A/N hope you guys liked chapter 12

Sorry, but no excuses

'Thought'

"Words"

"EVA communication"

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Why Me

Chapter 13

Zeruel/Death of a Friend

3 Days later

The alarm klaxons blared all through Tokyo 3 as Zeruel made his approach. It was exactly as I remember it, except that the damage to the city was much worse. We knew from the start that a lot of people were dead, at the time though, we didn't know how bad it really was. This time there would be no hiding how may were dead as Nerv had done before.

We deployed inside the GeoFront to intercept Zeruel. Shinji had a standard pallet rifle, Asuka had a pair of rocket launchers, I had my progressive sword and Rei had her sniper rifle. Yui…Mom was in command at the time, since she was the former head of Nerv back when it was the Gerhen Research Institute the UN thought she would be perfect. No one knew where the commander had gone; no one had seen him for a few days.

My adoption had gone through, so the command staff was forced to resort to first names to differentiate between me and Shinji; after all, we were both Ikari's now. In unit 03 the original Sato thought it was cool that I had been adopted.

Lilith also thought it was good, it seemed that as long as I was in one of the Eva's I could talk to her.

We waited in more a less ambush formation. I was hiding in a group of buildings covering my Asuka, and Rei was propped up on the opposite side of the pyramid with Shinji covering her

Zeruel breached the GeoFront exactly on time; Misato gave us the heads up

"Ok its on its way inside, Rei once it sets down open up, Shinji cover her when she comes under attack. Asuka, when it turns its back to you, hit it with everything you got, try to neutralize the AT Field, if it gets close go for melee combat, understood"

We all responded affirmatives, Misato closed her com line and I opened one to the others

"Ok guys this should be the last really tough one we'll have to face on the ground, be careful. Shinji, Rei when it turns that energy weapon of it's on you, hide behind the pyramid and then get out of range, Asuka and I will hit it ok. After that it's all up in the air. And watch for its arms"

I got affirmatives from everyone and we waited, a moment later the ceiling in the GeoFront seemed to explode, Misato came over the line.

"Here it comes"

Into the GeoFront came Zeruel, the 14th angel. I had been afraid of the angels I had fought before, now I was outright terrified. This thing could mop the floor with each of us with out any problems at all.

As it touched down Rei took aim and fired. The slug from the rifle bounce off the AT Field and into the ground, Zeruel turned toward Shinji and Rei and fired. Shinji pulled Rei off of the Pyramid just as the energy beam hit, destroying over half of the structure.

That was our cue; Asuka sprang out and started to unload her rocket launchers into its back. I stepped out on her other side ready to push her back behind the building should it shoot at her. It whipped around and unfolded one of its arms, it shot the appendage towards Asuka, but before it could reach her I turned and sliced it off. It retracted the arm and shot out its second one before I could react. It sliced unit 03's right arm off at the elbow, dropping the lower arm and my sword to the ground. I had never felt that kind of pain in my life. I saw its eyes flash and I tackled Asuka back behind of one of the buildings just before the energy blast destroyed the area we had been standing in.

"Sato you ok"

"Fine Asuka, where's my sword"

"Melted, the Angel's energy beam hit it"

"Damn"

I activated my left arm progressive knife and stood up. My right arm still hurt but not as bad. Misato's small image appeared in a box on my screen.

"Sato, are you ok"

I smirked.

"It's just a flesh wound"

Mom's image appeared beside of hers.

"Glad to see you're since of humor is still intact, we cut the sync circuits to your right arm, how's it feel"

"Not to bad now, now how are we gona kill this thing"

I honestly had no clue last time unit 01 got…close…and…wait, that had to be it.

"Is there anywhere we can box this thing in?"

Misato tilter her head to the side a bit.

"What do you mean?"

"Well it's really good at medium to long range fighting right"

Misato's face lit up in recognition, she knew where I was going with this.

"So if we can box it in, we can force it into close range combat"

I nodded.

"Exactly, if we can lure it into Head quarters, maybe the cages, we can close it into close range combat"

"Maybe, hang on a sec; I'll have to run a plan through, just keep it distracted for a moment"

We kept it distracted as best we could, dodging and all. At one point I got so desperate I pulled out my progressive knife and chucked it at the angel…imagine my surprise when I discovered my targeting computer had designated its forehead, or what would pass for one on this thing, as a target. The knife sank into its face followed by a bright flash of light from its eyes, its energy guns had blown. The angel was disoriented but only for a moment. Before any of us could react it lashed out with its arm and grabbed unit 00 by the head and squeezed, just before the head imploded Rei ejected.

Seeing its new toy no longer occupied the angel decided to throw unit 00…at me and Asuka. Unit 00 slammed into us knocking both of our Eva's over. The bulk of Unit 00 hit Asuka's Eva in the chest, unit 00's right foot however, found Unit 03's temple, or mine depending. The last thing I heard before blacking out was a defining roar.

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I awoke in the same hospital room I had been in after attempting to test unit 00, I looked over and saw a mat of reddish gold hair on my bead side

'Asuka, to think I couldn't stand her at first, now I'm in love with her'

I gently reached over and brushed some of her hair out of her eyes, they slowly fluttered open.

"You idiot"

Her words didn't have much power behind them and the soft smile she was giving me told me she was happy I was awake.

"I can't believe you, knocked out by a flying Eva"

I sat up a bit.

"Well its foot did kind of thwack the side of my head, how long have I been out"

"Almost a day"

"Damn, who got the angel?"

Her expression dimmed.

"Shinji got it, his Eva went berserk again, it tore the angel apart, their still cleaning it up"

She nodded toward the bed next to mine, their lay Shinji with Rei asleep in a chair at his side with her head resting on his right shoulder. I carefully stood up, my legs were a bit wobbly but nothing I couldn't handle with Asuka's help.

We made our way over to Shinji's bed. I walked over to Shinji and shook his other shoulder slightly.

"Come on Shinji time to get up, come on brother mom will be mad if you sleep in"

His eyes slowly opened, I smiled a bit.

"Welcome back to the land of the living brother"

He gave me a questioning look.

"It's just an expression Shinji"

He smiled a bit and nodded.

"Where's Rei"

"Look at your right shoulder"

He looked over at her, smiled and kissed her on the forehead.

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We made our way home later that evening after we were released, Misato and mom said they had to talk to us about something.

We all arrived at the apartment to find Toji and Hikari sitting in the living room. Hikari was leaning against Toji, everyone had slightly pink puffy eyes, they had been crying, even mom. She motioned us over and we all sat in the floor on the other side of the coffee table, we sat in pairs, me and Asuka, and Shinji and Rei. Misato finally broke the news

"Ok kids listen, something awful happened, one of the shelters got hit during the attack"

Shinji cringed.

"Was it by an Eva?"

Misato shook her head

"No it was before it came into the GeoFront…Kensuke Aida was killed"

Shinji instantly when into hysterics while Rei and mom did their best to comfort him. Hikari started to cry again and I could see tears running down Toji's cheeks though he only made a slight whimpering sound.

I just sat there and let the tears fall quietly, I was too shocked for anything else…one of my friends was dead. Asuka put her arms around me. Comforting me as she knew how to.

"I'm going to kill the bastards"

Everyone looked up at me.

"I'm going to kill every last one of the Adam spawned bastards. Asuka, Shinji, Rei, Toji, you guys with me"

Toji looked a bit puzzled.

"What do you mean me?"

I sighed.

"I can't believe no one told you, our school was set up to keep all of the perspective pilots in one place, specifically our class 2-A. A standing for only A-Rank pilot candidates"

Misato scowled at me.

"They weren't suppose to know that"

"Kensuke knew, why do you thing he kept asking…because he knew he had a shot at it, Mom, unit 04 is re-build able right"

She nodded.

"If we had a core component yeah…why"

I turned to Toji.

"You in"

He thought about it for a second then got a determined look on his face.

"Yeah, I'm in. better to be in one than die in a damn shelter"

Hikari griped onto Toji who smiled and looked down at her.

"Don't worry, I'll be fine"

Behind us the phone rang, mom answered it. I put my hand on Hikari's shoulder and smiled.

"During an attack the safest place for him is in an Eva, anyway the rest of us will be with him"

She nodded and pressed her face back into Toji's shoulder, I had no clue how what I had just done would affect everything. Mom walked up to us.

"Shinji, Sato, we have to go"

We both turned to her and Shinji asked the obvious.

"Why"

"Your fathers back, he's in his office…well my office"

I tilted my head a bit.

"I don't follow I thought you had temporary command"

"No they gave me permanent command after the attack when he didn't show, he wants to see us"

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We arrived in front of the Nerv commander's office door, mom's new office.

"You kids stay here for a moment, I'll be right back"

I didn't catch the look on her face, but I could hear it in her voice, Gendo was in for it. After she closed the door behind her I walked over and placed my ear to it. Shinji sat down on a nearby bench.

"Should you really be doing that?"

I brought a finger to my lips and shushed him. I kept listening; I could barely hear through the door.

"Yui…"

SMACK

I cringed a bit, that had to have hurt fro me to hear it. The next thing I heard was mom yelling

"WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, I ASKED ONE SIMPLE THING OF YOU. TO LOVE SHINJI IN MY PLACE BUT YOU COULDN'T EVEN HANDLE THAT COULD YOU"

"Yui please…."

"NO, no more excuses. We made a promise Gendo, to always be a family and to push on no matter what. YOU BROKE THAT PROMISE"

"Yui, everything I've done was…."

"STOP, just be quiet. How the hell can I trust you again after what you did, what you planed to do. No matter, it won't happen now anyway. I'll make sure of that"

"Yui, all I wanted was to be with you once mor…"

"I said be quiet"

I was starting to get just a bit scared, I had never heard her, this mad before. Hell I think all guys get this was when a woman is this pissed. I saw Shinji with his ear on the other double door which leads to the office.

"It doesn't matter what you wanted now. This is over Gendo, were over. The only things I want to think about right now are my boys and making up for lost time with Shinji"

Shinji was smiling like an idiot, so was I for that matter. Silence prevailed in the office for a moment until Bastard Man broke it.

"Boys?"

I heard mom slam, what sounded, like a folder onto his (or her) desk.

"As of yesterday I officially adopted Sato, he's my son now. Also, the UN placed me as the Commander of this instillation due to your going AWOL during the last attack"

I heard her turn toward the door, I caught her comment just as me and Shinji booked it for the bench.

"Be sure you're out of my office soon"

A/N I am so freaking sorry this took so long, but I had to make sure this was how I wanted it and a lot of stuff got in the way.

I can't promise when the next on will be out, I'll try. And before you say a word, THIS WAS SUPOSE TO BE SHORT!!!!!!!!!!!!