Doctor Who: The Evangelion Error (Book One)

E5 Part 7: Is my child organized?

Third Floor Hallway

A lot of things happened at once. Misato tackled Shinji to the ground, shouting something. A desk came hurdling over his head, scattering the first of the horde like ninepins. He heard the crack of Mr. Kongo's shotgun going off – he could see the... the not-zombies charging towards him –

"STAY BACK!" the Doctor shouted. "Everyone, just STAY BACK!" He rushed past Shinji, dragging the fire extinguisher behind him with both hands. He spun around and tossed it into the middle of the crowd. It bounced off the ceiling and disappeared into the mob...

There was a hissing sound. A blast of dark smoke flooded the hallway. Through the haze, Shinji could see the shadows of figures twisting and milling about in confusion.

He felt Misato pull herself off on him and stand up. The smoke started to clear. The horde lay in a twitching pile on the floor, a handful still meekly attempting to crawl down the hall. Beyond them, he could see Kensuke, eyes practically bulging out through his glasses, attempting to push a masked high schooler twice his size off of him, while Hikari looked on nervously from the classroom door. Behind him, further back by the bend in the hall, Rei paused, a desk suspended over her head with one hand.

The Doctor stepped past Shinji and went to the side of the closest not-zombie. He felt his wrist for a pulse, then stood back, satisfied. "Well," he said. "Think we can call that a successful field test, can't we?"

***

Classroom 3B

Shinji carefully dragged the tall girl – her broken arm set with a yardstick and Scotch tape – back into the room the horde had emerged from. Rubble lay strewn everywhere, including a massive chunk of concrete embedded into the floor. Just above it was a large gap in the ceiling at least a meter in diameter.

He stepped over the unconscious not-zombies and made his way back to the newly-completed barricade by the classroom door, where the others were waiting. "That's the last one, right?"

"Yep. Good work." The Doctor turned to Misato. "I've got a few more extinguishers filling up down the hall. I can't tap the vents for the entire building from here, so we'll need to get them to the roof somehow."

"How many do we have?"

"Five total. Figure we should leave at least one here in case there's any more trouble."

"Fine," Misato said. "Mr. Kongo, I want you to stay here and watch the students. You, too, Rei." Rei nodded. "Continue to maintain contact with Command at all times. The Doctor and I will go out and attempt to flush out the building through the air conditioning system."

Mr. Kongo shouldered his rifle. "Sounds easy enough when you put it that way."

She looked at the Doctor. "Any objections?"

"Nope. Question, though." The Doctor pointed to the knife on Misato's belt. "Meant to ask - what's that thing, anyway? You never said."

"This?" Misato unclipped the boxcutter-like item and extended the blade. It seemed to glow slightly – or maybe that was just a trick of the light. "NERV prototype. It's a personal-sized version of the progressive knife we use on the Evas. We've been evaluating it for mass production."

Shinji nodded to himself. That's why the knife looked familiar, then. The Doctor eyed the blade thoughtfully. "Huh. Monofilament carbon-nanotube wire accelerated around a superconductive magnetic core, using sonic vibrations to shape the cutting surface. Nasty. Should beat out my Ginsu kit something fierce, though. I'll give it that."

Misato retracted the blade. "How soon will the chemical be ready to move?"

"Shouldn't be too long now. Though –" The Doctor snapped his fingers. "Ooh. Almost forgot. One last thing to take care of."