The power went out

The summer sun blazed down on the sparsely populated street.

There were no birds on the utility poles, yet birdsong could still be heard.

"I won! I won!" A group of children chased one another, laughing and playing.

Aoba Shigeru smiled as he watched them run past him.

Then he took the drink he had just bought from the vending machine's dispensing slot, popped the tab, and gulped it down.

Inside the dry cleaning shop behind him-

Bzz-ding!

The cleaning machine sounded an alert, and its metal drawer slid out with two garments inside.

Their style made it easy to tell they belonged to Akagi.

"At this rate, the cleaning bills are going to add up." Akagi picked up her clothes with a helpless look.

Beside her, Ibuki picked up her freshly cleaned clothes as well and sighed to Akagi. "I wish I had time to do my own laundry."

"We're lucky we even get to go home." Aoba Shigeru finished his orange juice, crushed the can, tossed it into the trash, and walked in from outside with that teasing remark.

Before long, the three arrived at the subway station leading to NERV's underground base.

The train's red light came on, and its doors slowly opened.

An elderly man was engrossed in a newspaper. Hearing the doors open, he lowered it slightly to look.

"Oh, it's the Deputy Commander."

"Good morning." Akagi greeted the elderly man.

It was Fuyutsuki.

The two behind her stood straight, holding their clothes, and greeted Fuyutsuki with serious expressions.

"Good morning."

"Good morning."

"Yes, good morning," Fuyutsuki replied mildly, turning back and lowering his head to continue reading.

The doors closed.

"You're up early today," Akagi said as she sat down beside Fuyutsuki.

"I have to go into town to take care of something for Ikari," Fuyutsuki replied, looking at his newspaper.

"There's a regular Review Council meeting today," Akagi added, turning toward him.

"What a tedious job... Ikari always dumps the odd jobs on me. If it weren't for the Magi, I'd have been at my wits' end long ago." Fuyutsuki couldn't resist complaining about Gendo Ikari.

"Speaking of which, the city councilor elections are coming up soon, aren't they?"

"The city councilor elections are just a formality. In practice, the Magi handles the City Government's affairs," Fuyutsuki said, revealing the truth.

Aoba Shigeru and Ibuki stood beside them, holding the overhead straps.

Ibuki asked, "The Magi is those three supercomputers, right?"

"With those three computers making majority decisions, the Magi is a system that operates entirely in accordance with nationalism," Fuyutsuki said proudly.

"The council relies entirely on those three computers?" Ibuki asked in disbelief.

"It's the least time-consuming and most efficient form of government," Fuyutsuki answered.

"Just what you'd expect from a city of science. We really live in an age where technology can do anything!" Ibuki said happily.

"What a tired old line," Aoba Shigeru muttered wearily. After all that talk, workers like them still had to handle everything that came afterward.

"By the way, aren't you conducting a Unit-00 test today?" Fuyutsuki asked Akagi.

"Yes. The Second Extended Operation Experiment is scheduled for ten thirty today," Akagi answered.

"I look forward to hearing good news," Fuyutsuki said, offering her a polite wish for success.

"The conversion efficiency is 0.008 below the theoretical value. That's concerning."

After comparing the experimental results, Ibuki reported the data to Akagi.

"It's barely within the predicted margin of error. What should we do next?"

"Run it again with the same settings. Try lowering the mutual conversion value by 0.01," Akagi ordered after reaching her conclusion.

"Understood?"

"Then begin the experiment!"

Meanwhile, Misato was about to take the elevator to see Akagi.

Just as she was about to close the elevator doors, a familiar male voice reached her.

"Hey! Wait for me!"

His footsteps noticeably quickened.

Without a change in expression, Misato pressed the close-door button.

Just as the elevator doors were about to shut, a hand suddenly reached in and blocked them.

The doors still caught his hand, making him cry out in pain.

Misato gave a wicked little smile, enjoying his misfortune.

"That run wore me out. Whew, you're in a bad mood. Did I say something I shouldn't have last night?" Kaji panted slightly and thumped his lower back with one hand.

"That's because I had to see you first thing in the morning," Misato said sarcastically.

Meanwhile, Shinji-

Stood in front of a green landline telephone.

A woman's voice came through the phone.

"Please hold for a moment."

After a stretch of gentle music-

"What is it?"

A deep male voice came through the receiver.

"Um... Father."

Shinji was anxious, his thoughts struggling to keep up, and he stammered a little.

"What's wrong? If you have something to say, say it!" Gendo Ikari sounded impatient, his words coming out briskly.

Shinji was visibly startled. Unable to get the words out, he tried to figure out what to say.

"Um... There's a School Advancement Meeting at school today. The teacher asked me to tell my parent." As Shinji spoke, he kept clenching and unclenching his hand.

There was unmistakable hope in his voice as he said the last sentence.

"Haven't I already left all that to Katsuragi? Don't call me over something this pointless. If there's nothing else, don't bother me." Gendo Ikari made his arrangements-and his meaning-perfectly clear: in short, don't call and bother him.

Huang Zhetian watched Shinji from a short distance away.

He took a sip of orange juice and thought, What a loving father and devoted son.

"Huh? Did the power go out?" Kaji asked, puzzled.

The elevator's floor indicator had stopped going up or down and gone straight to zero.

"What? That's impossible," Misato immediately denied it.

No sooner had she spoken than the elevator lights went out.

"That's strange. Was there an accident?" Misato was instantly proven wrong.

"Did something go wrong with Akagi's experiment?" Kaji asked, apparently having found a possible explanation.

At that very moment, over where Akagi was-

All the data on the large screen slowly went dark.

"The main power supply has stopped... Voltage is zero."

Akagi's finger had yet to press the power-off button.

The staff around her immediately turned to look at her.

Embarrassed, Akagi glanced left and right and offered a feeble explanation. "I didn't do it..."

"Hard to say."

"It's fine. It'll switch to the backup power supply right away," Misato said casually.

In the command room-

"No good! The backup power supply won't connect!" Aoba Shigeru hurriedly reported.

"How could this happen? Are there any working circuits left?" Fuyutsuki asked in disbelief.

"Only 1.2 percent, and those are all old circuits numbered 2567 and above," a staff member below replied.

"Divert all remaining power to the Magi and Central Dogma," Fuyutsuki ordered.

"That will affect life support throughout the building," Aoba Shigeru warned.

"It doesn't matter. This takes priority," Fuyutsuki said dismissively.

Skipping over Hyuga's side of things...

Over where Huang Zhetian was...

The sun beat down on Shinji and the other three.

"That's because Commander Ikari really is busy, right?" Asuka said comfortingly.

"Is it? I don't think he hung up. Could something have gone wrong?" Shinji hesitated, but still voiced his doubts.

"Honestly, you're a grown man. Could you stop fussing over every little detail?" Asuka said disdainfully, holding her bag behind her back with one hand.

When they reached the railway leading to NERV's underground base-

Shinji swiped his card to get through, only to find that the machine's display didn't respond.

"Huh?" Shinji thought he had done something wrong.

He swiped it again, but nothing changed.

No response.

Rei Ayanami stepped up to try, with the same result.

"What are you two doing? Let me!" Asuka said from behind them. She pushed Rei Ayanami aside, took out her CD card, and swiped it.

No response.

Refusing to accept it, Asuka repeatedly swiped her card up and down.

"Seriously! This thing's broken!" Asuka shouted in frustration.

She felt she had embarrassed herself in front of the three of them.

Huang Zhetian stepped forward to check and said bluntly, "The machine probably isn't broken. It's a power supply problem. There's no electricity."

"Impossible! Something like that would never happen at NERV," Asuka immediately rejected the idea.

"What if someone did it deliberately?" Huang Zhetian said with a chuckle.

"What?"

"Let's find another exit first... Anyway, we have to get to the underground base's Command Center. I think something's about to happen. We can talk on the way." Huang Zhetian immediately turned the corner to look for an exit.

Looks like another Angel is attacking. This time, it's the Rain Angel.

Ding! System mission issued.

Defeat the Rain Angel to receive a reward of 1,000 points.

Additional reward: one Crystal Necklace (unknown grade; requires blood authentication).

The Rain Angel really has it rough. Even after I arrived, it didn't get stronger like the other Angels.

It used to be 800 points. Now it's 1,000 points.

I suppose that counts as progress...