[Episode 106871] [Episode 106871]"Seen the news?"
Gendo Ikari shook his head, not looking up from the 12-gauge shotgun shells in various states of disassembly on his kitchen table.
"Had a story about the Ayanami girl. Parents are looking for her. Think she was kidnapped."
Gendo turned a shell over and let the buckshot pour out onto the messy pile of gunpowder-stained metal he'd left in the center of the table.
"Wasn't front page news or anything. Just on the Channel 5 news, near the end of the show. Probably not gonna be a problem."
Gendo picked up a small handful of cheap earrings from the pile to his left and used his palm to funnel them into the now-empty shell.
"Just something we gotta be aware of. Might want to hold off on getting the next kid for a few weeks. We don't want to make front page. Gotta be careful."
"I'm always careful, Kouzou. If I wasn't, I'd be dead by now." He finished sealing the shell he was working on, drew a "S" on the sideof it, and rolled it over to the pile of completed ammo. His hands found the next shell and began to remove part of the cartridge case without looking at it. "Heard back from Misato?"
Kouzou leaned against Gendo's kitchen counter, the rivets of his jeans turning up small knots of curdled marinara sauce from one of the innumerable stains upon it. He took a drag from his cigarette before responding. "Told me she didn't want to use her cell any more. Said they already had her home scoped out and that they weren't far from tracking her signal. Said she had a lead on something big. Bigger than the Rots we've been dealing with. She said it was 'vampires on the board of directors big'."
Gendo rolled away another completed shell. "Board of directors of what?"
"Wouldn't say. She told me she'd meet me in person before Friday. She still has a couple of days."
Gendo nodded. For a couple minutes, neither of them spoke. Kouzou inhaled from his cigarette, not tapping off the ashes until it had burned nearly down to the filter. Gendo turned out shell after shell filled with tiny silver flechettes. Kouzou pulled another cigarette from the sleeve of his ratty flannel shirt and pressed it into the embers of his almost-dead one.
"Ritsuko sent me an e-mail," Kouzou said after a time. "Says she found the second kid. Name's Langley. Asuka Langley."
"Is she certain?"
Kouzou looked away, cigarette crammed between his middle and ring fingers. "She says she's sure. Me, I don't know. I wasn't sure about the Rei kid either. Still not."
"Being sure is Ritsuko's gift. Being swift is ours. If she's certain, I trust her." Gendo pushed his chair away from the table and cracked his neck. "Thirty shells done. That'll have to do for now. Starting to cramp up."
Kouzou nodded. "Still have to test them. Don't wanna go up against some kind of creature and find out the silver shells won't fire."
"That we do. But not right now. We've got something more important to do."
"Like what?"
Read the comments on this episode
(Posted Fri, 25 Jun 2004 19:59)
Questions? Problems? Suggestions?
Send a mail to addventure@bast-enterprises.de
or use the contact form.
らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
All other series and their characters are © by their respective creators or owners. No claims of ownership of these characters are implied by the authors of this Addventure, or should be inferred.
The Anime Addventure is a non-profit site.