2022-05-26: A Dictionary of Angels

• Log: 2022-05-26 A Dictionary of Angels
• Cast: Kaworu Nagisa, Mari Makinami Illustrious, Zoia Surovy, Eisen Daiwel, Ouka Nagisa, Asuka Shikinami Langley, Koji Kabuto, Ruri Hoshino, Eight York, Liam 7-020, Lucine Azul, Yuka Ohta, Shinji Ikari
• Where: Tokyo-3, Free Japan
• OOC - IC Date: May 26, 2022 (0096)
• Summary: Kaworu puts on a lesson on Angels with Mari as his teaching assistant for NERV and NERV allies. Many secrets are revealed while others remain buried. (This scene was ICly recorded for non-attending NERV characters to watch, though take note that the video version was edited to cut audience commentary and just input a text version of relevant questions.)

---

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        Kaworu Nagisa is not the type to go out of his way to bring attention to himself, but when he was transferred to the Free Japan branch of NERV, it was as 1) an administrator, 2) a reserve Evangelion pilot, and 3) an expert on kaiju and hostile aliens with a specialty in Angels. That's all on the books. If he keeps receiving questions about Angels--a topic he's supposed to specialize in--then it's only logical to hold a seminar on it.
        
        He hasn't been loud about it. He simply posted it in the NERV database as a topic of interest and is otherwise letting interested parties come to the lecture hall where it's being held. Kaworu awaits his students (it's a strange thing, thinking of them as "students"), smiling and nodding in acknowledge to each as they enter and find a seat. There's plenty; this is the type of lecture hall that has the teacher at the bottom of a row of cascading seats.
        
        Kaworu himself is seated upon a desk, one leg dangling off the edge while the other balances upon it, one arm draped over a leg while the other arm leans behind him seemingly to prop him up. He's dressed in his administrator outfit--black suit, purple scarf-tie with green stripe, beige jacket with his name and a winged gold star insignia that denotes his rank embroidered on the breast--and despite the heavy topic, he seems fully at ease. A retractable metal pointer rests near one hand, and a projector screen spools down nearby. He's joined by NERV bridge operator Maya Ibuki, who's standing nearby in her own NERV uniform, paperwork tucked under one arm, and fellow Evangelion pilot Mari, who's got her own vibe going on.
        
        Sadly, there are no refreshments.
        
        Once local time ticks to 7 PM, Kaworu leans forward, elbows resting on his knees. "Hey. Thank you all for coming," he says, as friendly and casual as ever. "As you're all already aware, this is to be an informational session on the kaiju known as Angels. Since there's a limited amount that NERV knows concretely about them, however, it will also be a session to speculate and discuss. Please also be aware that some of the information that is available is restricted, and so if you continue discussion of it outside this lecture hall, be mindful and discreet.
        
        "With that established, I'm going to present the facts I'm allowed to with the help of my assistants, Ms. Ibuki and Ms. Illustrious," he nods to Maya and Mari in turn, "and then we'll open the floor to questions and discussion. Understood?"

<Pose Tracker> Mari Makinami Illustrious has posed.

Administrator Kaworu Nagisa has set up an information exchange on the topic of the Angels.

Child of No Designation Mari Makinami Illustrious has magnanimously volunteered to assist him in this endeavor.

And by 'assist' we mean, in the language of Mari Makinami Illustrious, 'she showed up roughly a day after the announcement and said she was now Kaworu's ~ * <3 teacher's assistant <3 * ~ and then just started doing her own thing'.

The sparkles, hearts, and tildes were all implied heavily in the exchange.

And so that's why.

Mari is here and she does, indeed, have her own vibe going on. Said vibe is crisp and suspiciously professional, consisting of a sleek, dark gray military-style jacket, its cuffs maroon, its shoulders a deep navy blue trimmed in gold and a maroon tie done in a tight Windsor knot to match its gold-trimmed collar; a simple belt to cinch the jacket at its waist; and a pencil skirt stopping just above the knees to complement the knee-high boots to finish the outfit.

The strict professionalism of it all complements her hair, done up in a tight bun with only a pair of reddish-brown bangs to frame the side of her face, and her extra professional red-rimmed glasses.

Even her carriage is impressively austere! Standing, not slouching! Hip cocked at an exact professional angle! Riding crop securely held in both hands behind her back!

...

Riding crop securely held in both hands behind her back--

why does she have a riding crop--

"Welcome, welcome~," is her cheerful greeting, somehow carrying an air of distant menace despite the fact that it is unflappably friendly.

Who can say why, really.

<Pose Tracker> Zoia Surovy has posed.

For all that Zoia's been fighting Angels lately, she's far from an expert on them. She has things to learn, too - and no one seems to know more about these creatures than the very fluffiest person her age in the NERV ranks.

Nerd that she is, she picked out a seat in the front row. She's in her plug suit - it's pale blue with highlights in white and smoky grey - but she's got a crisp white labcoat on over it, fitting well with her large round glasses and the pen tucked behind one ear. There's another pen in her right hand.

This is largely because she has an entire binder open in front of her. It's full of lined paper.

When the time ticks over, Zoia sits up a bit straighter and smiles brightly, ever the horrendously eager brown-noser of a student. "Alright! I love facts," she responds cheerily, bright-eyed--

She pauses and gives Mari's riding crop a look. A thought briefly occurs to her, and she quietly takes her first note:

        - please step on me

<Pose Tracker> Eisen Daiwel has posed.

Eisen is remarkably quiet, entering the premises of Kowaru's teaching facilities. Being the kind of Chuuni youth, he clearly ought to sit as far in the back as possible. However, declaring himself a Mad Scientist, that proposition means that he clearly should be in the front.

Upon entry, the youth actually takes some time to consider where to go, until deciding that he'll stand in the back.

A reasonably compromise.

He's largely looking to observe and learn.

<Pose Tracker> Ouka Nagisa has posed.

        Speaking of those who does not go out of her way to bring attention to herself: Ouka Nagisa is one of those who has arrived for the seminar. Whether by her own powers of observation or by having the knowledge of the upcoming class forced upon her, once the knowledge became known it was only natural that she would seek to become part of it. Despite all the combat data she has ... reviewed, the Angels (and kaiju in general) are wholly outside the realm of what she was raised and trained to kill.

        She has so many ways to kill a human, and so few to kill an Angel.

        As for her outfit she (not being a spy) (or a princess) is wearing her typical School uniform - metal pauldrons, shoulder bars, OS-link wristlets and anklets and all. She doesn't look like an Eva pilot and that's because she is not, just like she is technically not a part of NERV but instead part of an auxilliary unit.

        She walks into the room exactly fifteen minutes prior to the start. Her posture and imperious gaze indicates this is 'professional' Ouka. All cold mature calm when compared to 'Onee-sama' Ouka's reassuring warmth. She arrives with no notebooks, no paper, nor any computer or electronics. When her eyes gaze upon Kaworu she offers him a pilot bow, and when they slide across Mari another one is given...

        ... followed with her eyes snapping on the riding crop, her eyes narrowing and lips pulling ever so slightly taught.

        If disappointed or confused she makes no further show of it, and instead moves in smooth, well balanced glide to one of the seats that best satisfies her interest of being nearest the exit to the room, as well as seated next to as few people as possible. Today isn't a day for distractions, after all: She's here to learn.

<Pose Tracker> Asuka Shikinami Langley has posed.

When Asuka first heard about an Angel seminar ran by Kaworu, she rolled her eyes and rejected the idea of attending. As if there was something the session could teach her that she didn't already know. Until she just happened to overhear that Mari volunteered herself as Teaching? Assistant???? Suddenly suspicious at the intentions of the mysterious Child of No Designation, she went back and forth on whether she was coming or not until the very last minute - right after her latest session in the simulators.

Thus she's here, still in her red plugsuit as well, she's added a layer of a zipped up darker red jacket with a white stripe down each sleeves because she figured the lecture hall would be colder. She's seated herself down in a chair in the very back of the hall putting her legs up on the seat in front of her, hands stuffed in her pockets. She's brought her Wonderswan just in case there's nothing worth seeing or hearing here after all, but she doesn't have it out yet.

Probably because she's eyeing Mari suspiciously in the first outfit she's seen that wasn't a 'school uniform' or a 'plugsuit' like she's assessing a prior boast by Mari about having a better fashion sense than her. "If I'd known she was going to wear that I wouldn't have come like this..." She mutters to herself, complaining that her current attire isn't exactly going to challenge that boast.

When she spots the riding crop, she raises a single eyebrow but doesn't remark on it. Just waiting for it to begin, and not being disruptive YET as her eyes wander to check out who else is in the lecture hall.

<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.

Sometimes it pays to have family working in the NERV apparatus; through Tetsuya Tsurugi, Koji Kabuto has secured access to this seminar. He even has a valid reason pre-prepared, though ultimately his reason for attending is scientific curiosity.

The wave of nostalgia as he walks into the lecture hall slips a smile onto his face - it wasn't so long ago, after all, that he was attending wholly different lectures. He's dressed in his usual blue suit with a pale pink shirt and a red tie, Photon Power Research Institute pin worn on his lapel. He finds a seat in the middle row and pulls an earpiece out of his pocket, hooking it over his right ear and sliding a lens out over his eye before clicking a couple of buttons to change his gadget's settings to pick up audio input and print it to the lens. He'll filter for the relevant information later.

That done, he opts to look around at the others in attendance, his eyepiece helpfully assigning names based on the databases it has access to. (If anyone it can't identify gives their names, he'll add them later.)

... Why does that teenager have a riding crop. Weird.

Never mind, Kaworu has started speaking. Koji focuses.

<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.

        Ruri Hoshino, Nadesico systems operator come bridge attache, may well be the shortest person here -- she won't technically even be a teenager for a month and change, yet. She's neatly dressed in her Nergal uniform, all gold and white, blue logo on the arm, black shorts. Her white-blue hair is pulled up in twintails around a similiarly pale face, with gold eyes which are too, too bright.

        She steps into the lecture hall, quite serious, and takes a seat with Lucine. She has a data pad with which to take notes, of course. When Kaworu introduces his assistants, she nods, once, to each of them in turn.

        She doesn't greet Kaworu beyond meeting his gaze, of course, because this is a serious meeting. Ruri is working right now. It's foolish to expect frivolities from her, right now.

<Pose Tracker> Eight York has posed.

Eight York is in uniform! It's natural to be in uniform for something like this, Londo Bell prominently notable along with her rank insignias. In fact, she's in the more formal version, with the long coat and important Captain's hat. She was invited here as an ally of NERV, and is glad to get some more information on all this. And to see...

That's a nice uniform Mari's got on. If Eight notices the riding crop she doesn't so much as blink at it, but she gives Mari and Kaworu both crisp nods and a smile in greeting.

She moves to a seat near the front, where she pulls a notebook she'll be using as well. And in fact, that seat near the front?

She sits down right next to Ruri. "Hey there," she greets, and they are WORKING TOGETHER now.

As for Koji's scanner, it reveals her as Captain Eight York, in Londo Bell, of Winter Wonderland. And Eight looks curiously at his eyepiece!

But she pulls out a pencil either way; she does intend to pay attention. ....But she's immediately caught with a distraction; she catches sight of Asuka. Her expression starts to thin--and then she tilts her head. This is... different.

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        As one of NERV's newer pilots--and a veteran of exactly one anti-Angel operation--Liam would be remiss in his new duty if he didn't keep himself well-informed about their implacable enemies. He arrives with five minutes to spare, pauses just to one side of the classroom door, and looks out at the lecture hall as if seeing something deeply noteworthy for the first time. It's a classroom. Like the ones in high school and college? He's never seen one this big before.

        Liam has acquired a proper uniform, as well: a grey flightsuit similar to the ones worn by STORAGE's pilots, but with NERV insignia and detailing. For want of a last name (that he's given to NERV), the number '7-020' occupies his nameplate. His combat boots are likewise brand-new, and space-age milspec. A red beret sits atop his head, bearing the NERV logo on a pin and helping to hide his scars.

        "Administrator," Liam says, to Kaworu, before...

        They don't have assigned seats? He doesn't see his name anywhere. Is he supposed to just pick one? He was never allowed to do that. But thankfully, there's someone here he feels comfortable sitting with, who has a friend in tow. "Lucine," Liam says, offering her a tiny smile as he takes a seat on Lucine's other side, not that far from Koji. (His AR nameplate simply does not exist.) He glances at Ruri, but doesn't distract her; instead, he pulls out his beloved, battered old tablet and prepares to take notes.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        Dressed in the Nadesico uniform of black and red dress, Lucine does dress it down a little with a dark jacket, easily allowing her to zip up and obscure the logo later on. There's a garden exhibition nearby, and it would look strange if she was walking around in uniform! "Ah! Miss Ruri, over here!" She waves Ruri over, unable to keep the excitement out of her voice. "I've never been in a lecture hall... It's just like I see in movies set on Earth... Mr. Nagisa's even wearing a school uniform..."

        Why is Lucine not in school herself? ....

        Oh look, there's that Singing Pilot, Mari!

        Lucine looks over Mari's outfit, furrowing her brow. Hm. HM. She knows what that is, from her culture lessons with her robot tutor Dadaleus. Oh, that looks like... the thing that is used with horses on Earth!

        Maybe there's horses here? She's never ridden a horse since they didn't have any horses in Nemi, but they did have a few goats! And a few cows.

        When Eight sits to the other side of Ruri, Lucine finds her attention drawn inexplicitly drawn to Eight. .... That's.... she's... a Newtype? Maybe someone more skilled, if Lucine is able to sense her this readily. If Eight looks, she might see Lucine's gold eyes trying to look at her without being too obvious; if their gaze meets, Lucine will look away, trying to appear innocent. Or, at least, give the appearance for the sake of not seeming rude.

        "Liam." Lucine smiles and nods in greeting as he sits to the other side of her. "This is Miss Ruri Hoshino to my right, here. Ah, Ms. Hoshino," she says, shifting back to calling her something more professional, "this is Liam, er.... 7...."

        Oh thank goodness, Kaworu is speaking now.

<Pose Tracker> Yuka Ohta has posed.

Some people scramble in just in time. Some people show up fashionably late. Some people fight at the doorway to be the first one into the lesson.

Yuka Ohta is none of those, because she's been camping out in the meeting room for multiple days. She's even moved one of her workstations in here, which has some kind of unsettling flesh parts underneath a dome, alongside what appears to be shavings of a keratinous nature, a small portable generator, and a blowtorch. There's also a refrigerator off to one side. Amazingly, she also looks wide awake, and remarkably clean. She's wearing her regular STORAGE Assault Team uniform with safety equipment over top, and has a few different notepads and a book on hand to write in, each carefully divided between different particular topics of interest. Her eyes wander to each person as they enter, hands taking notes in a specific divider marked ominously as 'Human Study'.

Naturally, humans are not typically kaiju in disguise, but there's always that slim chance... There may be other reasons as well, but this one is decidedly the most essential in her mind. Also anyone who looks at her workstation might swear they see her samples squirm once. But only the once. Must be a trick of the light, or muscle spasm caused by the electricity.

The Kabuto Monocle-Scanner identifies her as Yuka Ohta, head of STORAGE's kaiju and robotics research division and developer of both their current mobile weapon units.

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        At the corners of the lecture hall, several surveillance cameras are also online, the red RECORD lights ablaze like tiny stars to indicate the attention of eyes outside the classroom. No need to pay them any mind.
        
        Of the attendants to his lecture, Kaworu catches Ruri's eye and his smile broadens briefly. Everyone gets a polite-to-friendly if silent greeting, though, including Liam, who addresses him vocally. He is wearing a suit with a jacket rather than a school uniform, but it may well look similar enough to one for Lucine to make that mistake. As for Mari's outfit, he seems supremely unbothered by it... but that may just be Kaworu for you. Maya, for her part, fidgets a little, but otherwise keeps her composure. She is a professional, after all, even if Kaworu's going to be taking point.
        
        "To start, allow me to ask you all a question: what caused Second Impact?" Kaworu waits for someone, perhaps several someones, almost certainly NERV allies rather than members, to (maybe after wondering what this has to do with anything) explain that a tiny meteorite traveling at close to the speed of light crashed into Antarctica, near-instantly melting the polar cap and causing an instant rise in world sea levels. This is public knowledge, after all, especially for people who are old enough to have lived through it. Kaworu nods patiently as answers come in. Then:
        
        "All of that is a lie," he states calmly.
        
        He allows a moment to let that sink in. Once it has, an image of a group of people lined up in several rows in an observing station appears; windows indicate the vast icy plains of Antarctica. One of the people in the photo, a dark-haired girl maybe 12-14 years old, might be recognizable. The projector itself seems to have come alive of its own volition, but maybe he has a timer set up. (Ruri would tell that Kaworu instead simply, and not unkindly, told the projector to do so.)
        
        "Approximately fifteen years ago," Kaworu continues conversationally, "the Katsuragi Expedition, pictured here, found an ancient being slumbering beneath the frozen fields of Antarctica. While investigating it, it awoke." Click. An image of the now-blasted South Pole and the red seas therein. "The energy that being emitted wiped out most of the continent and almost the entire expedition team. The last actions of several of its members ensured that the being was contained and neutralized, but before that happened, it spread the seeds of its progeny into the world.
        
        "This being was dubbed 'Adam'--the First Angel. Almost all the other Angels were born from him. The Evangelion Series was constructed in anticipation of their return... and the need for their annihilation."

<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.

        The scanner, naturally, reports that Ruri Hoshino is the Nadesico's systems operator! She's in the employ of Nergal, despite her age. She has no service history before her posting to the civilian battleship.

        "Ms. Azul," she greets Lucine, as she comes in to sit beside her. They came here together, no doubt, but it's a big lecture hall!

        Eight joins Ruri on her other side; there's a shadow of gratitude on her face, as she looks over to her, whose depths can easily be felt by the Newtypes flanking her. "Captain York." Ruri doesn't leave the Nadesico often; she's actually a little nervous, to be in a big room with so many people, right now.

        (One of those people are Asuka. Ruri elects not to call attention to that.)

        On Lucine's explanation, Ruri nods to Liam. "Mr. Seven." Oh no! This is a terrible misunderstanding! And not one which Ruri is spending too much time addressing, either.

        She is, after all, focused on the briefing.

        "A small meteorite travelling close to three-hundred thousand kilometres per second impacted the polar ice caps of Antarctica in an landing which resembled the Chicxulub crater which coincides with the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary," Ruri recites, encyclopaedic. "That is, the meteor which killed the dinosaurs. Because of the size and location of this impact, melting events instead caused a significant rise of sea levels." She did her reading!

        She is also wrong. Ruri doesn't look particularly cross about this, mind you; she wears the same neutral expression she wore when replying to Kaworu in the first place. She quiets as she listens, having not been prompted for more input.

        An ancient being...

        ... so, Ruri thinks, these Angels they've seen now are not invaders from outside.

        They were born... here.

<Pose Tracker> Yuka Ohta has posed.

The slightly gremlin-shaped science lead is silent while Kaworu asks his first question. Everyone knows the official story of course, but she's done experiments to replicate the meteorite story on a smaller scale. Several times in fact. It's never once worked the way Second Impact was claimed. So when he speaks of the ancient creature within the caps, she whispers "I knew it!" low under her breath.

But this presents further question. One she's quick to seize upon. "This Adam. Was it truly born here, as many kaiju are? Or is it a result of a long-forgotten arrival from another world? Both are equally common of course. And its spawn, how has their development and nature been altered from the progenitor by the environments they find themselves released in? Of course, the progenitor himself, are there any remains? Or perhaps a still living form, held sealed away for our protection?" She could go on with biological questions for DAYS if not stopped somehow. And many that no doubt even Kaworu is not free to actually answer.

<Pose Tracker> Zoia Surovy has posed.

Zoia doesn't answer this one. She got the 'Evangelion: The Basics' briefing when she got in the entry plug sometimes.

Nevertheless, she jots a few things down in her notebook, before leaning forward and cupping her cheek in one palm as she watches the projector play things out. Pensive eyes search the screen for a moment--

Zoia presses her lips together for just a moment, eyes darting in one direction.

Up she looks, tapping her pen butt against her cheek.

"You implied there are Angels that didn't come from Adam," she observes with a cant of her head, straightening in her seat.

<Pose Tracker> Ouka Nagisa has posed.

        Once Ouka found her seat and sat down, her golden eyes have remained at the front of the room... for the most part. The red blinking from various corners of the room does draw her eyes, but only just along to note and mark their location within her mental map. Most other members in the class room do not earn a glance...

        ... Ruri is one. Not only for her short stature and youthful appearance, but the apparently palor of her skin and hair. That appearance tickles at the edges of the torn out holes in her memory.

        Then there is the nearby figure of Liam - he was one of those recovered from within Jophiel, was he not? Her eyes trace the edges of the fluid intake ports and scars upon his back. Those are not familiar to her in the same way Ruri's appearance is... The School focused on surgical, adrenal changes not cybernetics.

        And finally she notices sitting near the back with her is the Loud Phoenix Herself, Hauptmann Langley. Ouka's eyes scan her direction when she hears her voice, and in particular when she complains about 'she' and 'wearing that' how she 'wouldn't come like this'. The First Boosted Child's own golden eyes follow the blue eyes' gaze back toward Mari. She says nothing.

        And the presentation begins with a rhetorical question... and an answer from Ruri. One that only causes the tickle at the edges of her broken memories grow stronger. Ouka herself doesn't even try to answer - she's here to receive, and not give.

        And receive she does... with information regarding a Katsuragi expedition, and an image of the South Pole and red seas within. Golden eyes actually go wide at this.

        'That being was dubbed 'Adam'--the First Angel.'

        So many questions fill her mind. None she will ask, though some no doubt will be tended to through the mouths of others.

<Pose Tracker> Shinji Ikari has posed.

Shinji Ikari was here all along! Really!

He is also in what is becoming a distinctive plug suit and track jacket outfit, with his leg at a funny angle because he can't bend it super well, especially after refracturing it during his fight on the moon. Shinji absoutely wasn't napping while all of these important people were here learning NERV's greatest secrets. When Mari waves that riding crop around, some instinctual fear causes the younger Ikari to snap awake, hoding in a cough because THE REAL KOJI KABUTO'S HERE GOSH and trying not to blush. It's not that he hasn't read the papers on this, it's just he's still half on moon time.

"Did I miss anything important." Shinji mutters to Asuka under his breath, just like they were at school. "Did they ever figure out who Eve is, or was that a red herring?"

<Pose Tracker> Asuka Shikinami Langley has posed.

Asuka looks down to the row of Liam/Lucine/Ruri/Eight without a word, though Eight might briefly feel a minor spike of annoyance as she notes her beside Ruri that recedes just as quickly after. She looks at Yuka too, someone unfamiliar to her but... the STORAGE uniform at least hints at who she is enough to her.

Koji's scanner would identify her as Captain Asuka Shikinami Langley of the AEU, pilot of NERV (noting she holds no officer rank in NERV). As two small tidbits of trivia notes she's the youngest ever to receive the rank of Captain in the AEU and that she received her Master's Degree in Theoretical Chemistry from the University of Munich shortly after her thirteenth birthday.

Her eyes shoot over to him at one point, a look of recognition in her eyes. She doesn't greet him otherwise though, just seeming to note who he is.

The lecture begins shortly, with a question, and Asuka doesn't bother even entertaining the idea of fielding it - letting Ruri do that instead, instead glancing at one of the surveillance cameras out of the corner of her eye - before her eyes return to the front of the classroom. The initial 'shocking revelation' doesn't get so much as a reaction out of her.

What she does instead is stare at the picture on the projector, focusing immediately on the dark-haired girl as the 'Katsuragi expedition' is put on display for the whole world to see. Misato's pain put on screen as a historical record. She doesn't react otherwise - only staring in a way that makes her feel voyeuristic.

It serves as a reminder of why she's meant to be used - she just minds being used less when it's by her.

It's Yuka's sudden barrage of questions that knocks her out of that short reverie, as she clucks her tongue in annoyance, "Tck." It hardly matters that they are good questions, just that it caught her at a bad time.

Which means Shinji's question comes at an even worse time, as he awakens from his nap to leans over and asks a question like it's a lecture in class, she replies back, annoyed, "You really expect me to keep track of these things for you? How am I supposed to know what you think would be 'important'?" Shinji's second question though sinks in, and Asuka just turns and stares at him. Before leaning over, and cupping a hand over her mouth to whisper back, "What are you stupid? You didn't just ask me that question. Where do you think Eve is?"

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        "Hello, Ruri," Liam says, his voice calm and studiously polite. But he doesn't have time to say more--or to correct the misconception--because the lecture's starting!

        Liam's brow furrows in thought as Kaworu asks his question. He knows the answer, of course--or thinks he does--because he learned about it from school, and from his family. He was all of three years old at the time; his sole relevant memory is of his parents hugging him, and telling him that no matter how bad things got, they loved him, and would care for him.

        He was a nervous child, sometimes, and his parents loved him deeply. They told him that a lot, up until the day their luck ran out.

        A twinge of pain bubbles up through Liam's consciousness, but it doesn't surface on his face. He lets Ruri explain--

        And then he feels eyes on him, tension curls into a knot in his chest. He glances about the room, as surreptitiously as he can manage, before he notices the young woman with the green hair and gold eyes. He saw her on his way in, and didn't think anything of it, but there is something unsettlingly familiar about the way she's sitting, taking it all in.

        When Kaworu drops the bomb, Liam's head snaps forward to face him, and he stares at the images as they flash across the screen. The teenage girl sticks out in his mind like a splinter beneath a nail--what's she doing there?--but the image is gone the next second. That Katsuragi?, he's left to wonder, as Kaworu continues. The grief and anger spike again, silently, as Liam is left to chew on what Kaworu's just left him with. How would people react if they knew that a group of scientists--however inadvertantly--had caused that kind of horror?

<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.

Koji doesn't bother even trying to answer the Second Impact question, in part because Operator Hoshino is already demonstrating an impressive command of the Popular Facts and because part of him is already expecting those facts to be a cover-up, which might be illustrative of his trust in the Federation right now if you wanted to draw any inferences from that. He just nods when that cynical impulse is confirmed and focuses on the actual details.

... The fact that a scientific expedition produced monstrous horrors to plague humanity is not unfamiliar to him. Thank goodness Hell is dead, he'd be fascinated by these things.

The biblical etymology is not lost on Koji, in fact it follows logically from the use of the term 'Angel' to describe these entities, but it hasn't presented any questions for him yet. He does cock his head at the sound of muffled (indignant) whispering from somewhere behind him, failing to hide a little smirk. Not so different from college after all.

Zoia brings up the gap between Adam and his? its? progeny just before Koji is about to inquire on this angle. These kids are quick on the draw, he thinks to himself, looking again at Ruri and frowning at her apparent age versus her listed role. Why would Nergal need a child to operate their new cutting-edge craft? Maybe if there's time after the lecture he can approach and find out.

Ah, here's a question that probably sets Kaworu up for a segue: "What factors necessitated the need to develop a new classification of mobile weapon to combat the Angels?"

<Pose Tracker> Eight York has posed.

Eight's not worried about the cameras. She knows they're there. Frankly, she assumes that this being a NERV facility that there's more she can't see. But while she's studying Asuka, she notices Lucine looking over at her, her attention drawn inexorably. Lucine is... looking at her. And then looking away. And then looking at her. And... hmmmm.

Eight winks at Lucine. "Hey there," she greets her, with one of her most charming smiles. ...She doesn't actually know why Lucine is looking at her, no.

She waves to Liam, too, and to everyone who acknowledges her for that matter. ...But she spots the shadow of gratitude on Ruri's face, and just smiles again at her for it. She will shield her younger friend from too much socialization!!

She notices the spike of annoyance out of Asuka, but she notices it more for the fact that it isn't a giant wall of rage than anything. So she nods to Asuka, distantly.

But the briefing... Eight doesn't volunteer to answer; she's more interested in letting someone else have the prominence--but when Kaworu makes his calm statement, Eight lifts an eyebrow. A certain amount of 'what you know is wrong' is to be expected when learning things, in her experience, but this is a pretty big one. It does sink in. And so, she listens. Fifteen years ago... Eight, of course, doesn't remember anything from that part of her life, not really. So she couldn't say what she was doing for sure at the time. She places it in context of the Before Times, though, and...

"So there's been no success in managing to communicate with these 'Angels', even with all that time," she says, but it's more a statement than a question. It is a thoughtful one, at least. She doesn't ask why they have to be annihilated, though those who can sense it can figure that she wishes she could ask that question, were naive enough to, one one level.

"Do we know how many more of this Adam's 'progeny' escaped into the world?"

She watches Liam for a moment, able to feel his feelings in the moment. The question comes to mind...

But she also wants to know what Koji wants to know, looking to him curiously.

<Pose Tracker> Eisen Daiwel has posed.

There's perhaps nothing more suspicious than a particular Chuuni being... well... quiet. Remaining at the back for this time, he listens to Kaworu as he explains what truly happened that day. Second Impact. In his mind, he notes that the date isn't long before his birth. But he doesn't say anything. He just bloody listens and watches as visual assistance is brought to bear in the form of the Katsuragi images.

The Angels were seeded, like a Fungus sending out its spores. The Angels were born from 'Adam'. The biblical references that run the gamut within NERV seem to only rise in occurrence.

Bearing his closed (and slightly too big) labcoat, his body shifts only when Yuka Ohta begins to ask questions. Very similar ones that he would have had. Of course, she is a scientist, so of course she'd know to ask the smart questions!

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        Koji and Ouka's scanners (as well as any others that happen to focus in Lucine's direction), will likely pick up new information that is pretty mundane: she is a pilot of the Nadesico, as well as its gardener, if it even gets a mention. Also, if the scanner is allowed to search histories, the name 'Azul' might spring a result about a Kris 'Kit' Azul, a bounty hunter of some infamy from 0070s and 0080s, who also had a reputation for designing vehicles for similarly danger-seeking enthusiasts before retiring. A lot of the results are from people arguing the specs of different units he built and how they compare to other great builds of the 0070s and 80s. In other words: vintage mobile suit nerds. Tred at your own risk.

        Eight seems to have Ruri's trust, or, at least, her relief. And she's warm enough, though Lucine's cheeks are pink from the fact that Eight saw her staring.

        And Lucine has already Mess Something Up as Ruri takes her introduction very literally. "Uh, it's--" Well it would be rude to interrupt Kaworu's lecture. Liam will have to forever live with the admittedly snazzy name of Mr. Seven.

        ".... There was... a meteor? That struck the Earth, on one of the poles?" Ruri provides the much more impressive answer, and the dark teal-haired pilot nods.

        It's a lie.

        Lucine tilts her head, wondering if she may have misremembered. But then, Ruri herself provided the answer, so maybe it's not that at all.

        "... Wait, were the Angels supposed to be aliens?" Lucine whispers to those nearby. "... I just... never thought about it? Since kaiju seem to have a habit of just appearing..." She trails off, noticing the spike of emotion from Liam.

        It's clearly not the mishap of almost getting stuck with 'Mr. Seven' that caused it, Lucine knows, at the very least. Perhaps it's the talk of the exhibition. Or the fact that one of the team is a child. Lucine tries to give Liam a sympathetic smile if he chances a look her way, then looks to the front.

        ".... Ah, you said 'almost all'," Lucine softly comments, after raising her hand (like in shows!). "... How many survived?" Not who. That seems almost too intimate a question, even if she hopes one of those survivors was that child.

        "So we would just need to find where all the other Angels are, right...? Would they still be in Antarctica?"

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        Koji's scanner (as well as any others that happen to focus in Lucine's direction), will likely pick up new information that is pretty mundane: she is a pilot of the Nadesico, as well as its gardener, if it even gets a mention. Also, if the scanner is allowed to search histories, the name 'Azul' might spring a result about a Kris 'Kit' Azul, a bounty hunter of some infamy from 0070s and 0080s, who also had a reputation for designing vehicles for similarly danger-seeking enthusiasts before retiring. A lot of the results are from people arguing the specs of different units he built and how they compare to other great builds of the 0070s and 80s. In other words: vintage mobile suit nerds. Tred at your own risk.

        Eight seems to have Ruri's trust, or, at least, her relief. And she's warm enough, though Lucine's cheeks are pink from the fact that Eight saw her staring.

        And Lucine has already Mess Something Up as Ruri takes her introduction very literally. "Uh, it's--" Well it would be rude to interrupt Kaworu's lecture. Liam will have to forever live with the admittedly snazzy name of Mr. Seven.

        ".... There was... a meteor? That struck the Earth, on one of the poles?" Ruri provides the much more impressive answer, and the dark teal-haired pilot nods.

        It's a lie.

        Lucine tilts her head, wondering if she may have misremembered. But then, Ruri herself provided the answer, so maybe it's not that at all.

        "... Wait, were the Angels supposed to be aliens?" Lucine whispers to those nearby. "... I just... never thought about it? Since kaiju seem to have a habit of just appearing..." She trails off, noticing the spike of emotion from Liam.

        It's clearly not the mishap of almost getting stuck with 'Mr. Seven' that caused it, Lucine knows, at the very least. Perhaps it's the talk of the exhibition. Or the fact that one of the team is a child. Lucine tries to give Liam a sympathetic smile if he chances a look her way, then looks to the front.

        ".... Ah, you said 'almost all'," Lucine softly comments, after raising her hand (like in shows!). "... How many survived?" Not who. That seems almost too intimate a question, even if she hopes one of those survivors was that child.

        "So we would just need to find where all the other Angels are, right...? Would they still be in Antarctica?"

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        Some, like Ruri and Lucine, answer Kaworu's opening question. Others, like Yuka, ask a bombardment of questions of their own, while yet others, like Asuka, Ouka, and Eisen, keep their thoughts to themselves. Zoia does neither, instead making an observation. Kaworu nods to her.
        
        "Yes. But for various reasons, only the brethren of Adam are relevant to this discussion." He gives Yuka a rueful smile, shared equally with Eight and her comment on communication. "All excellent questions, Dr. Ohta. Sadly, NERV's studies into the Angels are still ongoing." His gaze turns to Eight. "I can't give you an exact number, Captain York, but it can be considered approximately one to two dozen." To Lucine, he shakes his head at her second question. To her first, he states simply: "One."
        
        Shinji, meanwhile, no doubt already knows some of this, so even if it weren't Kaworu leading the lesson, he'll be forgiven for not-napping. After all, Misato showed Shinji the Second Angel herself during the battle against Ramiel; he knows a lot better than most. If Liam and others are more disturbed or upset... well, it's a disturbing, upsetting topic. That can be forgiven, too.
        
        "On that note, the Second and Third Angels are classified and not available for discussion," Kaworu says aloud, "so we'll skip ahead to the Fourth Angel... designated 'Sachiel.'" When Koji asks his own question, Kaworu simply smiles at him--and then a video that may serve as an answer begins to play.
        
        A massive giant with green skin, overlong limbs, a red jewel-like "core," and a strange mask-like face lumbers into view as fighter helicopters, jets, mobile suits, and other aerial weapons maneuver backwards. Each of them launch a barrage of missiles, gunfire, and so on into the massive creature, which literally blinks the attacks off. It even catches a massive missile the size of its arm bare-handed (if its appendages can really be called "hands"), and when it explodes, the Angel is left unscathed.
        
        The footage cuts ahead to a more distant shot of the Fourth Angel. The aerial assault swarming around it pulls back as it lumbers forward; a moment of stillness; and then a MASSIVE explosion that some might recognize as an N2 mine.
        
        When the smoke clears, Sachiel is somewhat melty. That's about it.
        
        "Miss Illustrious, if you would, please?" Kaworu prompts his TA.

<Pose Tracker> Mari Makinami Illustrious has posed.

For the most part Mari comfortably lets everyone get settled in and allows the lecture to begin without so much as a peep on her part. She doesn't even give Asuka any guff when the Second Child slumps into her seat.

No; it's only the exact second that Asuka complains to herself about Mari's fashion choices that she will suddenly feel an INTENSE PRESSURE of someone's attention bearing down on her.

And she need only look up to find Mari.

Winking at her.

Like she knew exactly what Asuka was muttering about.

And just like that, Mari turns crisply to face the rest of the crowd when Kaworu addresses them, revealing the true nature of the Second Impact with the bloody oceans of Antarctica. Mari herself looks rather unphased -- but then, she IS the Teacher's Assistant (~*<3*~). Obviously she has to come prepared!

It's only when people start asking questions that the crisply-clad Evangelion pilot's interest seems to be piqued. Her brows climb at a steady rate to the rhythm of Yuka's escalating questions; at the very tail end of that bombardment, said brows deflate back to normal levels in time with the loosing of a low, impressed whistle.

For now, though, Mari lets Kaworu manage - administrate, if you will - all these questions, as her attention drifts. First, to the recently arrived Shinji - is the soft 'thwack!' of crop against palm intentionally timed to his and Asuka's debate or is it just wonderful serendipity? - before her attention drifts once more, towards...

...

"Hum."

When Liam stirs from his reverie, he'll find Mari Makinami Illustrious standing in front of him, Lucine, Eight and Ruri.

He'll find Mari leaning in towards him.

He'll find Mari --

        sniff, sniff

-- smelling him.

"Hmmmm."

After which, she confides in him - them - a warm smile, remarks, "It's going to be okay," and then just wanders back off towards the center area of the lecture hall once more, in perfect time for Kaworu to pass things off to her.

"Understood, Administrator," says Mari, with a crisp professionalism that's only mildly undercut by the singsong of her voice as she taps her crop against the projector, gently. Once. Twice. Thrice.

And on the fourth, the video changes to -- what looks like a flip book animation of a tiny, cartoony Sachiel instead, callously laughing in a strangely "WA HA HA HA" way as all those conventional arms bounce off him.

"Angels possess something we call an AT Field," she explains helpfully, flashing Koji a warm smile. "I think the best way to describe it is a barrier for their heart that keeps anything from the outside world from affecting them. Beam fire, artillery, explosives -- the AT Field of an Angel is strong enough to repel any of those without extremely prohibitive applications of force. The best way to effectively penetrate it..."

And here, the doodle shows Evangelion Units-01 and 02 suddenly springing on the Angel from the sky, surrounded by big octagonal barriers of their own. What ensues is an AT Field-filled dustcloud scuffle, which ultimately ends with the tiny Unit-01 and Unit-02 victorious, performing a totally sweet high five over the prone form of Sachiel, helpfully drawn with 'X's for eye holes.

(beneath it all is a simple disclaimer reading 'NOTE: dramatic reenactment, not based on true events!')

"... is bypassing it with another AT Field. Evangelions are developed with their own, which lets them breach the Field, rendering the Angel vulnerable."

She pauses; that bright blue gaze lingers on Eight for a quiet moment as if she were seeing that hidden question within her initial statement, with a warm, uncritical look that practically invites the question to be asked.

Instead, though, she simply asides, to the actual, spoken question: "We don't! They haven't been born yet. It's an exciting mystery yet to be discovered~."

<Pose Tracker> Shinji Ikari has posed.

Shinji is used to the shouting, almost fond. He doesn't feel as bad as he normally would; he's on fairly heavy pain meds and broke a kaiju's neck the other night and is therefore firmly in 'command can push off' mode. It doesn't last, as he makes eye contact with the dead eyed Misato. His age.

Shinji remembers. He remembers being a bloody pulp after the Sixth Angel, the hours of surgery, the pain, the permanent scarring despite the best NERV could do in the field of bioscience.

'We're the same, Shinji.' She said, looking at him like she never had before. 'We've both been touched by those things, and survived. We might be the only people who ever have, right now.'

'That's a connection, Shinji Ikari. One that'll never change. Do you understand?'

And then it stands in front of him again, dread Sachiel. The 'tutorial level' he heard someone around the office say. Shinji's eye twitches. Enemy. Enemy. Enemy. Enemy. EN-

There is a flash of primal, screaming rage behind the right eye of Shinji Ikari, the kind of thick, bone deep hatred that is perhaps the sole providence of human beings. Shinji takes a breath, clinging to familiar bickering like a stout piece of fencing in a tornado. "I dunno, if I had to hide an Angel somewhere I'd stuff it into the creepy secret basement Dad doesn't like us talking abo-" Shinji's cut off. But by what?!

<Pose Tracker> Zoia Surovy has posed.

"Fair enough," Zoia concedes, and makes a quick note.

On the discussion goes; Zoia shifts in her seat to cross one leg over the opposite. Again she taps her pen against her cheek, biting the inside of the opposite.

        the Second and Third Angels are classified

Zoia's lips curve slightly downwards.

New footage appears - it's footage she's seen. She brushes back a lock of hair with the edge of her thumb before looking back to watch the expressions of those not affiliated with NERV. The particulars of Angel fighting are hardly strange to her, but for others, understanding of the threat may come as something new and disturbing.

When Shinji speaks up, Zoia glances sidelong at him and presses her lips together before turning her eyes forward again, entirely convinced he's about to be shut down completely. She considers a moment before catching her teeth around her lower lip.

"Their form factor is always pretty variable, isn't it?" she puts in, already knowing the answer. "None of the Angels we've encountered have been similar in more than a couple of broad strokes. Other than that, they don't seem to follow the same biological rules most typical lifeforms do."

<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.

        Ruri glances over to Asuka, when she hears the familiar sound of baka whispered in the hall. In the motion, she happens to catch Ouka's eye -- and notices her keen attention.

        It's just a moment's lingering, before Mari calls their attention to the front again. She finds herself face-to-face with --

        "Fool," Ruri remarks, dry and laconic, as Mari leans over to sniff Liam.

        She listens intently to Mari's explanation, though. The AT Field -- her mind goes to the Nadesico's Distortion Field, immediately, and she wonders whether they found that technology just the same.

        "How much of the Angel's physiology do you understand," Ruri asks, "given you're capable of designing your own AT fields in the Evangelions now?"

        There's something she's not saying, here, in this probing question. It's written in her eyes, meeting Kaworu's, as she asks the question.

        She remembers the screaming.

<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.

Koji has seen... not this exact footage before, but he has walked similar battlefields ten years ago, armies of conventional materiel woefully inadequate against Hell's kikaiju. He's unsurprised, though the transition from found footage to flipbook-doodling does get a grin from him despite the dark nature of the subject. "So Evangelion units possess the same heart-shield as Angels do and can use it to break through." That... well. There is an obvious inference to be made there, and Evas certainly don't resemble conventional robotic weapons, but he doesn't voice it yet.

A creepy secret basement, huh? It stands to reason an organisation as secretive as NERV has all sorts of unsettling hideaways and skeletons in its closets. The difference between it and his own Research Institute is not lost on him, but he supposes it's the difference between building your science organisation around fighting a hidden threat rather than around a miracle solution to an energy crisis - grandpa retired to start building his own weapon, after all.

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        A blur of movement, right in front of him. Liam startles in the middle of writing 'Katsuragi?' and underlining it; his grip switches up on the stylus, holding it tightly like a knife. For a few seconds, he is perfectly still, doing his best to head off a cybernetically-boosted threat response at the pass. Fear hammers against the walls of Liam's mind, and he takes deep breaths, lest it break through and lead to instinctive, violent action.

        sniff, sniff

        She's sniffing him. Like a neighborhood dog who just wants to know who he is. There is no way for him to tell if Mari Makinami Illustrious can smell human cortisol, but it's definitely there, in enormous quantities.

        'It's going to be okay.'

        Liam doesn't have words. He glances aside at Ruri, offering her a reassuring smile he does not feel. His emotions tangle into a knot--relief and fear and dread and sorrow and hot rage and bone-deep exhaustion. He just looks up at the display, and watches and listens as Mari explains. When it's question time, Liam raises his hand (because he saw Lucine do it earlier, and remembers it's polite), and speaks. "Jophiel's AT Field was suppressed by a series of tumors--suppressed, but still active. The Jama at least believed they were deploying it as a weapon. Is this a confirmed instance of a third party altering an Angel's physiology and behavior? Were they responsible for its... final shape?"

<Pose Tracker> Asuka Shikinami Langley has posed.

Asuka just glowers and looks away as Mari winks at her, "Cheeky." ...resolving to best her in this realm next opportunity, despite it being VERY DIFFICULT as she never knows when Mari is going to show up, and in what state she'll be in to know what state she ought to be in. Which just means she'll have to be prepared at all times???

Asuka though watches the footage of Sachiel. She'd seen it before - seen it before she even transferred. Though Shinji doesn't know it, she resented him from the first moment she heard an untrained kid got into an Eva and killed that thing on his first outing - something she'd spent her whole life training for. Even moreso when she found out it was Gendo's son. Small wonder her original nickname for him was Daddy's boy.

Asuka seems unphased by Mari sniffing Liam, and as she takes over the class - Asuka wonders if she's going to use that riding crop on someone to play the part.

When she takes over and shows the flip book animation, Asuka just sighsss at this turn of the lecture to teach the audience about an AT Field and its limitations in this way, followed by a dramatic reenactment not based on true events defeat of the Angel.

Shinji though, as he starts to talk, finds Asuka eyeing him for a moment as she catches his heated tone. As he continues though Asuka leans over whip quick and clamps a palm over Shinji's mouth, two fingers gripping his jaw to prevent it from opening anymore as her other hand grabs the back of his head to prevent him from trying to squirm away from her grip. "Shut up stupid-!" She hisses, in a hushed tone that probably isn't truly audible to many, before looking to the crowd just staring.

"Ignore him." Asuka demands of anyone who does, "Stupid Shinji's still high on narcotics after the last mission, so he's talking out of his head."

Asuka lies, though it's a believable enough lie perhaps given the recent state of his busted leg AND the fact that he was sleeping before the lecture.

She then leans over to whisper basically straight into his ear such that noone can hear this part, "Now. I'm going to let go of your mouth - and you're going to calm down and remember that there's some things that are better not to talk about in this crowd - or even at all, ever." As Asuka then moves his jaw to turn his neck and direct his eyes to one of the cameras, "Especially with eyes upon you."

And then... she lifts both of her hands away from him, glancing Kaworu's way, knowing fully well he won't LIKE this even if it was the smart thing to do.

<Pose Tracker> Eight York has posed.

Eight notices Lucine blushing a little more, and... well, she might be powerfully psychic, but there's a lot of people in the room, and she's not perfect. She makes an assumption about why Lucine is blushing at her so much, and her smile turns a little gentler. She won't bring it up during the meeting, of course.

...But she does lift an eyebrow at Mari... sniffing Liam??? And then trying to comfort him??? She has no idea what's going on with that. Wait... not just him. Them. "...Thanks...?"

She doesn't comment on a secret creepy basement. That's probably also classified. Apparently classified enough that Asuka does something about it. Eight looks over at her. "...Hm."

Classified. Eight is not entirely surprised by this, and doesn't push in this setting. She'll take what she can get for the moment; she knows how 'Classified' is. So she watches the video, instead. The strange creature... it matches what she remembers of the battle, and how to fight them. But what is the difference? What makes the Evangelions so able to do so?

"The AT Field... I see. Then that's why the Evangelions." Because they have their own. But Mari's gaze lingers on her, and Eight senses that invitation, be it in her smile or something else. So, after her original question is answered...

"I see. So we don't know, but there may be as many as a couple dozen." She pauses. "Hm. So... I'd taken it for granted that there was no way, since it's annihilation or nothing. But is it possible to communicate with these Angels? Do we have any idea what they 'want'?"

...Admittedly Liam's question is pretty alarming. Eight is alarmed.

<Pose Tracker> Eisen Daiwel has posed.

"The most concerning factor we have to consider, is that the Jama Empire may be more familiar with the Angels than ourselves at this point." Eisen has finally moved, having slipped up to a spot near Liam. Sitting on the 'top' of the seat's back, with one foot on the ground, and the other onto the actual seat part.

It seems he's more concerned with new information than anything.

He takes a moment to look at Liam 7-020 direction, his mechanical eye whirring and 'clicking', as if it were making adjustments to better see.

"It seemd like they had a way to suppress A.T. fields through other means."

He then quiets again, looking towards Kaworu and Mari. It's the matter of a 'heart shield' that is of importance to him. The way that Evangelions seem to change based on the ones who ride them. The very theory and language that lies behind Unit-Zahlos. No doubt he'd normally make a comment about how it's a shame there's only a few dozen. But he keeps that to himself.

"It's possible to communicate with them on a psychic level, we've found." Eisen then answers Eight, "Though it's..." He glances towards Lucine Azul for a moment, then forward again. "... not recommended. But I have some tests I'd like to do, if the Federation is willing to push some resources our way."

<Pose Tracker> Ouka Nagisa has posed.

        Ouka's eyes blink a few times in the sudden... stylistic shift of the briefing. Moving from file footage and real images to... childishly drawn images?

        ... why, she wonders? She has been fed combat data from various Angel engagements but admittedly they were almost always from the perspective of autonomous and standard ground forces. It was... less than enjoyable to witness events unfold from that perspective. Particularly with regards to the AT Field and their impressive defensive capabilities. Even a ground zero N2 Mine detonation wasn't enough to do more than melt the visible exterior.

        There is understanding that comes from Mari's enthusiastically animated picture show though. The AT Field produced by the Angels can be nullified by the same fields produced by Evangelions. As far as the Undesignated Child's other activities - namely sniffing Liam - she doesn't bother to remark. Though once again her eyes narrow and lips tighten just slightly...

        Ouka then notices another looking back towards her. Given her pallor, the lack of coloration to her hair, Ouka suspected perhaps that her eyes would be pale blue or pink in color. Instead they are gold - but not like hers. Ouka's are unnatural, a result of cruel science, and at times this can be seen in how her pupils will catch and reflect the light. Much like the eyes of a cat...

        'If I had to hide an Angel somewhere I'd stuff it into the creepy secret basement Dad doesn't like us talking abo-'

        Golden eyes snap to look toward Shinji, Ouka's expression is completely neutral. Her gaze still cool and imperious. He's cut off when suddenly Asuka grabs him on the back of the head and hisses at him to shut up. Ouka's eyes then snap to her as well. Her eyes narrowing just slightly...

        ... but once again she is here to receive, not to give.

        Once the interaction between Loud Phoenix and Ikari the Younger has concluded, her gaze will move back to the front of the room.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        'One.' Lucine chin lowers soberly, and she nods quietly.

        That survivor... how old would they be now?

        "Wh... h-hey!" Lucine's cheeks are still pink from being spotted as she suddenly finds Mari right there in front of Liam, _sniffing_.

        'It's going to be okay.'

        Lucine relaxes, feeling the ball of emotions from Liam next to her, and Ruri's subdued ???... something. Just what--

        Shinji is here. Lucine notices this now because that needle of urgency and rage is pressing down around the right side of Lucine's face, which she rubs a hand over.

        Sachiel. So. That must be why Shinji is feeling that way. "Ruri... was that the one that..." 'That the Nadesico fought', is what Lucine would say, if she managed to finish her sentence.

        Eisen's observation comes up, relevant and oddly ironic, as Lucine tries to understand what it was like to be at the helm of the Nadesico against that thing.

<Pose Tracker> Yuka Ohta has posed.

Ongoing investigation he says... She'll have to conduct her own then, or worm her way into this one. No, an independent study of her own will be necessary. Otherwise they'll classify information away from her, even the results of her own work. And that's the best case where they don't put a gag order or worse on her. But if she starts digging into and processing that information, she'll miss the briefing. Well... not really. She could probably turn around and continue her experiment, and STILL write down precise notes of everything tat transpires here.

But she has respect for someone who's coming out here to give them this info with real answers, even if it's been cleared with the higher ups to some extent. That he appears younger than her, AND is her most formal 'rival' in the field of kaiju biology are just bonuses to that respect. Honestly, the angels having no formal structure beyond a couple key features reminds her of something from a particular Tarabaman arc, focusing on repelling the stages of an invasion from a world that mistakenly believed Earth was gearing up to attack THEM. But everything concrete they do have is being filed carefully. With extra notation made to look into the classified data of the first three. Perhaps she could sneak a small enough scanning drone to examine the old Second Impact site for residual frozen scraps... She doesn't voice further questions yet. Thankfully other people still are. Also Mari's entire... Mari-ness, is being documented in her Human Study category. It's fascinating really.

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        "Thank you," Kaworu tells Mari as she acknowledges his request. The video footage swaps over to a sketchy animated recreation of the decisive battle against the Fourth Angel, Sachiel. As it plays and Mari gives her explanation of A.T. Fields and how to counter then, Kaworu gives her a long, considering gaze. Soon, though, his eyes drift to Shinji, as if sensing the throbbing beat of his distress.
        
        Concern shadows his expression... but he says nothing, letting Asuka handle him instead. He certainly doesn't like it, but he meets her stare with cool neutrality. "Do be gentle with him," he tells her softly--perhaps giving credence to her claim that Shinji's too loopy to be listened to, perhaps not.
        
        He doesn't comment on the basement itself any more than he comments on Mari creeping over to Liam to give him a good ol' sniff. Koji, Ouka, and the others will have to draw their own conclusions--indeed, it seems Koji already has.
        
        "I'm not a member of R&D, so I can't really remark on that," Kaworu tells Ruri, meeting her eyes in unspoken understanding. He remembers, too. He nods as Zoia weighs in with more observations, then adds, as much a follow-up to her as it is to Ruri, "However, it is known that Angelic genetic data is an approximate 98.9% match to human DNA."
        
        More clips, this time video footage once more, shift to the next three Angels, each labeled--Shamshiel, the Fifth Angel, run through its core by Unit-01's prog knife; Ramiel, the Sixth Angel, shifting in and out of various geometric shapes, then getting pierced through its core by a sniper beam; Jehudiel, the Seventh Angel, raising an A.T. Field against a barrage of crossbow bolts before Unit-02 inazuma kicks them through its core. Lucine's question is answered silently; the Nadesico can be seen in the background of the third shot. Each Angel explodes into what looks like an ocean of blood.
        
        "Defeating an Angel is not easy, but it *is* simple. Once you destroy the core, its fate is as you see," Kaworu continues as they run. He pauses to nod to Liam when he raises his hand, then smiles sadly at the actual question. "Yes," he states, just as simply. Eisen weighs in too, commenting that the Jama Empire, alarmingly, might know more about the Angels than NERV does.
        
        "Possible," he agrees. "The samples that were culled from the Eighth Angel are still under scrutiny, but from what is understand so far, the Eighth Angel operated by integrating outside biological material into itself and analyzing it during a digestion-like process. It seems that the Jama Empire fed to it materials and energy under their control, and so by proxy came to control the Angel itself. Since individual Angels are unique in their form and approach, it at least seems unlikely that the Jama Empire can use this technique to control another one."
        
        Though if they did, is there really anything NERV could do to preemptively stop them? ...Regardless, Kaworu lets Eisen answer Eight's question. Yuka's diligent note-taking, meanwhile, gets a smile out of him as he looks her way. If he has any inkling of her plotting, it's not apparent on his face.

<Pose Tracker> Mari Makinami Illustrious has posed.

'The form factor is pretty variable, isn't it?'

"Gold star to Ms. Surovy~," praises Mari in that typical way of hers that seems to expertly straddle a line between teasing and sincerity like some manner of quantum compliment. "You're right! Every Angel is very different. They're also all the same."

If that's a somewhat contradictory statement, it's okay, because Mari is nothing if not endlessly forward as much as she is oblique: "The part of the Angel that is the 'real' Angel is this part." And here, Mari swings her crop around to point in the direction of that big orb of coruscating, haunting blood red during the Jehudiel footage, that seems to almost flow like it were solid and liquid all at once before the whole thing ruptures. "This is the Core of an Angel; its 'heart'. Every Angel has one, with identical purpose and limitations. You can consider the body that surrounds this kind of like the suit of armor and weapons that it dons to be able to face the world~."

Like some sort of Eldritch version of a mecha, maybe--

"No matter what you do to its body, an Angel won't die, even if its AT Field is overcome. You wouldn't die if I stole your glasses, right? The only way to defeat an Angel is to break its heart." If anyone thinks this is her teasing, or being clever, or having a laugh, well -- Mari's expression is nothing short of ineffably sincere.

Her head dips to the right, after that, as Kaworu explains further. Her gaze drifts, from Asuka trying to silence Shinji (to which she quietly and surreptitiously clucks her tongue) until that sharp, keen stare falls on Ouka. To those tightened lips; to those narrowed eyes.

The Teacher's Assistant smiles a little smile.

Eisen confirms that communication has been attempted. A soft "hum" of thought dances off the tip of Mari's tongue. She gives the projector a good-natured pat.

And it's there that, right on cue, the footage shifts towards footage of the living island that is Jophiel and the fight taking place outside it; what goes on the interior is not seen. What is, is the way it, too, eventually disaggregates violently, the bloody rain of it and its explosive discharge heralding the oddly serene rainbow that is summoned in its violent wake.

And that's where the footage freezes.

"They want what any living thing wants," she says, simply, in answer to Eight's last question. It's vague, to be sure. But Mari says it with a certain certainty. "But the difference in that one point one percent between you and them is like the difference between stretching your arm touch the top of your head and stretching your arm to touch the edge of the universe."

Mari's arms cross over her chest. Her expression is patently unreadable, save for the faintest spark of curiosity. "Would you still like to talk with them?"

<Pose Tracker> Zoia Surovy has posed.

Zoia's pen darts across the page of her binder. She flips to the next one and takes a few more notes, nodding as Kaworu explains the similarities in DNA between Angels and humans.

There's something more there - something the little intellectual in her needs to explore. But now's not the right place to do it. Enough has been tossed at her already.

When she looks up again, she doodles a few small spirals in the margin of her page as she takes note of the various Angelic forms and their defeats. Once again, her teeth capture her lower lip.

Many of the samples from the Eighth Angel came from her. The fact that she lost one of them still bothers her.

Then Mari gives her a gold star! Zoia perks up in her seat, cups her hands to her cheeks and gasps, her eyes brightening brilliantly above a broadening smile.

Senpai noticed her...!

(okay maybe Mari isn't really her senpai)

Her hands fall back to her notebook, though her eyes follow the crop for an intent moment. Angel cores aren't news to her, at least. "Da, she's right," she puts in. "Any form that's built around the core is basically just an appendage. Until you do stuff to the core, you are basically just fluffing the Angel's hair!"

<Pose Tracker> Ouka Nagisa has posed.

        'It is known that Angelic genetic data is an approximate 98.9% match to human DNA.'

        Ouka has many ways to kill a human, but few ways to kill an Angel. It's a bit shocking to find out though that the difference between the two is as small as 1.1%, in purely genetic terms. Her mind is cast back into watching that rolling mound of flesh, clay and teeth. Watching it bubble and swell grotesquely before bursting like a swollen blood blister unleashing a torrent of crimson LCL. LCL which smelled much akin to blood. Human blood.

        For the first time, the First Boosted Child's eyes are open in something akin to visible shock. It seems that even through the frosty exterior of professionalism she manages that there is a way for the unexpected to pierce and find purchase in such a way to elicit an emotional response.

        The bindings that hold her tongue begin to twist and strain...

        ... it is perhaps this shift in expression that Mari notices, but then as the seminar turns onto how to defeat an Angel, and all that pesky motivation to express individual thought slides neatly back below the surface. Her eyes return to their normal cool expression. Soon footage of Jophiel's destruction, much like the same images summoned from within her own memory, plays out before her. Though she has had combat data from many conflicts against Angels run through her head... this is the first one she was a part of.

        'They want what any living thing wants.' Mari's simple response is tantalizingly simple, and horrifying in its implications. 'Would you still like to talk with them?'

        'Every Angel is very different. They're also all the same.'

        'But the difference in that one point one percent between you and them is like the difference between stretching your arm touch the top of your head and stretching your arm to touch the edge of the universe.'

        I am here because I am hungry' is different from 'I am here to scout out my enemies'.'

        'They haven't been born yet.'

        "Are they alone?"

        Ouka's voice rises suddenly over the din of the room. Even she looks shocked. After all, she hadn't felt any strain against her parameters at that moment. Yet something comes from her mouth, a question, nevertheless. Her mouth snaps shut with an audible click of her own teeth snapping together.

        ... well, what's done is done.

        "... I mean to say, are they able to communicate with each other? If each Angel is a single core, and every other Angel hasn't been born yet..." The Only Aurum pauses another brief moment before finishing her question: "Does that mean, assuming they can think, does that mean there is no way they can communicate strategic details with one another?"

<Pose Tracker> Shinji Ikari has posed.

"Would you get off?!" Shinji hisses at the same low level, clearly feeling that Asuka's brought more attention to them then letting the stupid comment go unquestioned. He flushes under the idea that they're being recorded acting like a pair of kids even as he squabbles with Asuka's grip. It's not thinking about the Angel fights, though, so there's that. "I'm fine, I'm fine!" As if Asuka was helping him instead of doing a comedy bit.

Ouka's look sobers him up, Shinji swallowing. It reminds him of when Ayanami would subtly chastise him with a glare, only a bit more violently. He doesn't mind the girl outside of their initial tiff, but Shinji can't help but feel like a deer in some hunter's crosshairs right now.

Thank God for Zoia being a nerd. "I wouldn't call the things those bodies can do 'just hair'." Shinji mutters, his attention turning to Liam and Lucene. Did he really say she contacted the Angel's mind?

They'd just laugh at him if he brought up what he saw in the Evangelion, Shinji thinks, it's just because I'm such a bad pilot, right? Shinji looks at this room of super soldiers and geniuses and heroes and feels small and alone. Still, Ouka's outburst gives Shinji courage, of all things. "But if it is possible to communicate. I mean, why do they hate us so much? I know they do, I've felt it, but there has to be a way to share the planet. This war can't last forever."

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        Shinji and Asuka scuffle, and Liam isn't entirely sure what they're fighting about. A basement? Here, or somewhere else? Probably the Geofront.

        But fear--even paranoia--runs scar-deep in Liam's nature. He files that one away for later.

        The videos mesh with what he personally experienced inside the Eighth Angel--each one of them has that red sphere inside, and breaking it reduces the entire creature to blood-colored fluid. Blood? Liam's not sure where the line lies. Mari compares the process to... something wholly different, which earns her a puzzled frown from Liam. But his attention quickly drifts elsewhere as he feels Eisen's attention come to rest on him. There's no sudden stress reaction this time, just a little jolt of surprise. His neck is exposed, he realizes. What is that eyepiece seeing?

        Liam jots down the figure '98.9%?' and underlines it. And then the angel he asked about comes to the fore, and Liam is quietly grateful no one decided to use footage from one of the machines inside. He could endure it, but the only person who might find it entertaining is that woman from STORAGE over there. (Did something just move in that weird workstation of hers, or did he imagine it?)

        "It had a function, then," Liam says. "But by accident, or by design?" That's a horrifying thought--the idea that the Angels might be adapting to understand their adversaries and better fight them.

        Ouka speaks up. Liam looks at her with wide eyes, as if she'd somehow intruded into his thoughts.

<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.

        "No," Ruri answers Lucine, matter-of-fact. Her emotions are carefully managed, in this environment; there's an undercurrent of nervousness, but it has as much to do with the environment as the subject matter. Certainly, none of it reaches her face. Zeno of Citium would be proud of her.

        That they are... so similar to humans, though... when Ruri's mind finds a moment to run through that information, the still pool of her heart is disrupted, concentric ripples fanning out from inside her. Her face remains stoic; it is a poor fit for the sadness it contains behind its bars, to hear that the thing they defeated is so close to comprehensible.

        Many things on Earth have such a close genetic match to humans, Ruri knows.

        That first genesis -- was also found on Earth.

        She isn't at all surprised that Eight asked the question she did. Ruri's eyes are on Mari, too, with her answer -- and she glances aside, to that strange girl, when she asks such a pointed question.

        "It's certainly different to fighting an alien," she surmises, flat of face and tone.

<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.

Right. Break the core and the Angel dies. Simple indeed. "A battle of attrition, then. Overwhelm its AT-Field and layered defenses before your side is incapable of pursuing the fight."

He looks around as others speak up. Many of these questions are things he'd been thinking about so it's good to have them voiced. The notion that they're capable of feeling hate is... not surprising, given the genetic similarity to humans, but even that value is unsettling in its own right, that something so similar to humanity could be so... anathema to them.

<Pose Tracker> Asuka Shikinami Langley has posed.

Asuka knows many eyes are on her and how bad this looks. It's just better to look bad than potentially to let Shinji finish that sentence and it actually become a big incident. She certainly knows that Kaworu doesn't like it, though she doesn't say anything when he says to be gentle with him, and who knows what Mari is thinking when she clucks her tongue at her!

It's already bad enough that she was put in this position of stopping him from running his mouth about things even she doesn't know, worse if she keeps saying anything at all. It just compounds her humiliation, not just for that fact but the fact that she knows how it looks.

"Are you?" She mutters to Shinji as he tells the room he's fine, twice. Like she doubts anyone who would blurt that out is 'fine' by any definition.

Eventually she settles back down in her seat, crossing the arms of the jacket worn over her plugsuit with a grumpy air to her as she sinks into her seat. Instead she watches clips of each Angel being defeated. One by one. Ruminating on the 1.1% difference that separates them and Angels as Kaworu spells it out. It doesn't sound big, but she definitely knows from her Uni studies that that much difference IS big.

She glowers at Zoia as Mari gives Zoia a gold star, though she has no real reason to complain, given that she's not answered a single question herself. Then rolls her eyes at Eight's question on whether one can communicate with Angels. "Don't be stupid..." She mutters quietly, noting Mari's answer lines up with her thoughts, though her head tilts and she gives Mari a strange look at Mari's curiosity over whether Eight would still want to try.

Ouka's raised voice to ask a question though. And Asuka's eyebrows just shoot up, like she didn't expect her to speak at all, much less ask a question. With Shinji seeming to follow up, emboldened by it. "Why do you think they hate us? 'You've felt it'?" Asuka says darkly and yet also aloud, "Why wouldn't it just be something simpler, like instinct?"

<Pose Tracker> Yuka Ohta has posed.

Another sweeping list of excellent information. Yuka's extrapolations and guesses are of course all written down. Guesses as to what each fact could mean. Positing ideas that humans could be a mutant strain born from Adam during his imprisonment. Or another of his kind. That brings another question to mind. That was Second Impact... was the first one a similar event? She can't speak on any of these thoughts, unfortunately. But there might be others.

She'll stay after the meeting to make a request with Kaworu. To ask if she might be able to study a partial sample they have on hand. Right now however... several people state a viewpoint she agrees with. She already has opinions on kaiju that the military finds troublesome. It's noted in her file that one goal of her research, beyond the weapons, is to enable humanity to contact and communicate. Which perhaps seems at odds with her zeal for dissection, until you consider it more closely. "...If we can grasp the cause of their hate, and any other rolled up emotions they feel. Perhaps we could reach an understanding. Though until that point, we don't have much choice about fighting, do we?" How many kaiju seen as natural disasters, are actually protecting a delicate home environment they need to survive? Or have circumstances nobody is yet aware of? What of the Wild Beast of Calamity? Is it the harbringer of disaster as the legend says, or perhaps...?

<Pose Tracker> Eight York has posed.

Eisen mentions communication; Eight tilts her head, thinking about it. "Not recommended...?" Hmm. She looks over Lucine. But when he mentions resources, she regards him for a moment. "Well, it's not something we could force on people," she says. She very much knows that they could force that kind of contact on someone, theoretically.

Alone...? What a curious question. Eight regards Ouka for a moment thoughtfully.

Vague, but certain. And Mari turns it around on her. So they're similar to humans genetically... but Eight knows that that doesn't necessarily mean much. All the same...

"Of course," Captain York answers, nodding to Shinji at his question. Do they hate them, then? "...Obviously if we could find a way to coexist that would be better than fighting. So sure I'd want to talk to them. It wouldn't be the first time humanity had thought there was a gulf too vast to cross and found a way."

"The difference doesn't scare me. ...But I gather it's academic anyway; if we were able to talk with them, we'd be doing it, right?" She looks to Yuka, and nods. "Yeah. If they 'hate' us, there has to be a reason." She's willing to trust 'I felt it', for some reason.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        'However, it is known that Angelic genetic data is an approximate 98.9% match to human DNA.'

        Now *this* surprises Lucine. She has sold herself on the idea that they were beyond humans, like something out of a 1920s horror novel. "I suppose... it's not too unusual. Fruit flies share DNA with humans, about 60%, and pigs, almost the same amount as many species of apes..." She looks aside to Ruri, almost going through the same journey of trivia around the same time.

        Lucine remembers comparing her own unit to Ranka as a suit of armor-- not just literally, but figuratively as well. Something that protects the most fragile aspects of herself from the outside, allowing her to take more risks.

        Like trying to rescue someone from an Angel, and finding herself inside that Angel. Surviving inside that Angel as long as she was inside her unit, though who knows for how long. Listening to the Angel knock against the monastery of her mind, wanting to know her so completely, just as it knows the poor souls, naked to its insides, that it had managed to scoop up with her. To know what made her the person she is.

        It didn't hate her personally. It just didn't mind that she'd be completely digested in the process, or that it'd likely use whatever knowledge gained from any of them to further its goal.

        "They do communicate with each other," Lucine answers aloud, to Ouka. "They can communicate psychically. They can feel pain and fear. But I'm not sure if that's an aspect of Jophiel specifically, or... but Jophiel was trying to communicate with another Angel, trying to get another Angel to stop its pain. The other Angel apologized, and said it'd put a stop to it soon, so... I guess if we hadn't intervened, the problem may have gotten worse." But if that is the case, why didn't an Angel come immediately after Jophiel had been destroyed?

        Unless it's on its way...

        Then she realizes that this might implicate her. Sure, Liam knows, Eisen knows, Kaworu knows, she's assuming (incorrectly) Eight knows, a good portion probably figured it out already, but...

        ... But also, Kaworu or Mari were going to bring that up next, so, really, she just looked like she was doubting the work they placed in their presentation.

        She sinks in her seat, not wanting to see what reaction Ruri might be having right now.

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        'The only way to defeat an Angel is to break its heart.'
        
        "How poetic," Kaworu remarks to Mari, as fond as it is bittersweet. She truly says a lot of fascinating things. "That's quite true." And when Zoia weighs in, he laughs, quiet but genuinely--if briefly--amused.
        
        But then Ouka makes that outburst, voice rising over the general din of the room and, in that moment, silencing it. Kaworu regards her with widened eyes. Soon, though, his lashes droop to half-mast.
        
        'Why do they hate us so much? I know they do, I've felt it,' Shinji proclaims. Kaworu regards him with eyes as red as an ocean of blood and a melancholy just as deep, even as he smiles at his insistence that surely, *surely* there's a way to share the planet with them.
        
        "It would be nice if there were," he murmurs. Then, of the war: "Don't worry, Shinji. It won't."
        
        His smile broadens as Yuka and Eight weigh in, suggesting along with Shinji that maybe they could talk it out with the Angels if they could just communicate. "You're very kind people," he observes. "I wonder what the world you all speak of would look like?"
        
        He turns his attention back to Ouka and Liam then--but Lucine answers them directly. Kaworu's eyes cut her way. "...."
        
        Then he looks to Maya, who up until now has mostly hung in the background. "Miss Ibuki, about what Miss Azul said... Could you please share NERV's findings during the battle against the Eighth Angel?"
        
        "Ah! Yes, sir," she replies, pulling up the folder she'd had tucked under one arm. "At the time of the battle, only one pattern was confirmed to be blue--blood type blue meaning an Angel," she adds by way of explanation. "That doesn't necessarily mean there *wasn't* another Angel, but if there really had been, it seems strange that it wouldn't have staged its own attack, especially given how everyone was weakened." Maya fixes her attention on Lucine. "We think the communication you, er... overheard... might have been from someone in the Jama Empire... but there's no way to know for sure, since either way, we only have your anecdote to go by."
        
        There's an apologetic tone to her voice. It might indicate, 'I don't think your experience is accurate to reality but I don't want to call you a liar.'
        
        Kaworu, who is neutral and unsmiling, adds, "...so she says."

<Pose Tracker> Mari Makinami Illustrious has posed.

Asuka gives Mari a strange look.

Mari, of course, can only respond in kind to her highness, and so she waggles her brows suggestively.

What she's suggesting is a mystery but it's also probably not what you think.

It's short-lived, however, because...

'Are they alone?'

A single question cuts through the arguments and the musings and general conversation. The waggling slowly stalls until Mari's brows stop in a wistfully arched position. Mari's lips purse.

"Oho?"

And that Cheshire Cat look doesn't -quite- fade, even when Ouka does damage control to correct herself. Instead, she lets Ouka work her way through her appended thoughts with casual patience -- and doesn't even interfere as Lucine chimes in to answer the question herself. In very specific detail and a very certain way.

Brows remain lifted for what must be some kind of record in wonderment as those keen blue eyes drag from Lucine, towards Kaworu.

She, graciously, lets the Administrator and, subsequently, Maya field this one; she is but a humble Teacher's Assistant, after all.

Instead, she just quietly hums the melody of an old song as Kaworu and Maya speak. 'Rainy Blue.'

It ends, at least, when Eight answers her question, without pause of hesitation: Of course.

Regardless of anything else that comes after, Mari Makinami Illustrious' response is an unfetteredly fond smile.

"That's a very human answer~."

Is it praise? It sounds like praise. Is it teasing? It sounds like teasing. Is it encouraging? It sounds--

... It's probably up to interpretation. Like all art, Mari would happily note.

But it's just as Kaworu notes, '... so she says' that suddenly

        -=THWACK=-

goes Mari's riding crop against the side of her thigh to cut through the noise like a thunderclap, and she smiles through the whole thing, chipper as can be, as she gingerly shuts off the projector.

"Righty-o!" she announces. "There you have it. An Angel's existence remains a solitary one, walled off from everything except the legacy of what came before them. Alas! But this marks the end of our time. If you have any further questions, you can feel free to ask me or Administrator Nagisa or even the <3 precious Ms. Maya <3" how can hearts be conveyed in tone so offputtingly clearly "in more intimate detail at a later date."

She winks here, because it's obligatory.

"I'm happy to break down any barriers you might need~."

<Pose Tracker> Shinji Ikari has posed.

Shinji shrugs apologetically at Kaworu, knowing he keeps making the administrator's job harder than it needs to be. They can't seriously expect these people to believe everything at the briefing when it opened with NERV admitting to a gigantic, world-wide cover up though, right?

Speaking of which, as Maya runs her mouth like a professional. Shinji can't prove it, and really why would NERV cover up the existence of another Angel, lying in wait to wage war on the world?

Shinji's dark thoughts are interrupted by the SMACK of Mari's riding crop, sending the poor boy almost out of his chair. "Makinami why do they keep giving you weapons!"

<Pose Tracker> Ouka Nagisa has posed.

        'Are they alone?'

        All at once, Ouka feels incredibly tired. Once she had gotten over the initial shock of her own outburst and done the best she could to word the question into ... well, something more meaningful, she feels as if she could pass out in her seat much like Shinji was earlier. Of course the distinction is that she would not, could not.

        ... just like she would not ask a question?

        Regardless it is her intent now to ride out the seminar in silence with her head bowed, eyes lowered. Not wanting to attract any more attention to herself - much less answer any follow-up questions.

        'I mean, why do they hate us so much? I know they do, I've felt it...'

        'Are they alone?'

        After this is over she will have to submit herself to a visit to the Moderator. It was going to happen anyway, given the need to parse her episodic memory following this seminar, but now there's another reason: Where did that question come from? Sure it is important from a strategic point of view to know a foe's numbers communication strategies... but what shocked her the most was what she felt when her lips moved to form that question:

        In Memories Lost:

        'Our finest doll. Congratulations, Aurum-1.'

        What odd words to say, to mean: That you are alone. That you are the last one. Strapped to a gurney and caked in blood - most not her own. Tears run down her face, running red across the otherwise sterile white surface of the gurney.

        Why? Why after being forced to fight, forced to kill, just to survive... why only now did she want more than anything to die?

        From Traumas Sleeping To Waking Torpidity

        Distant, Ouka listens to Lucine speak of Jophiel singing for help and Another answering. Then, as if in reply, Miss Ibuki explains that only one pattern blue was identified. What it does mean, what it doesn't mean...

        Aurum-One absorbs this data, like all that was shared in this meeting. Her mind is after all much akin to the recording devices on the walls: Unerring, barring unexpected interference or mechanical failures. This too was part of her design. After all, what better way to quickly teach a super soldier new information quickly than to make it so they can't forget unless you need them to?

                -=THWACK=-

        Ouka's eyes raise up at the sudden, sharp noise. She has missed all the curious looks her way, and now is only aware that the seminar is coming to an end. The girl from whence the loud snap comes asks if they have any questions lingering. Ouka does, but none of them that could be answered here.

        She will sit, quiet and still with her eyes lowered until the meeting finally adjourns. After which she will rise, offer a professional bow and cordial word of appreciation for and promise of application of the useful tactical data.

        To go and give what she has received.

<Pose Tracker> Asuka Shikinami Langley has posed.

Mari waggles her eyebrows at Asuka, and Asuka just holds eye contact for a moment, before looking away - feeling flustered and not sure why... waggling her eyebrows suggestively doesn't even seem to make sense to her!"What's with that look...?"

Listening to Kaworu entertain the idea of a world like where Angels and Humans coexist is galling to Asuka, since her existence is predicated on the idea that Angels are something that must be destroyed. Without that, she might as well not exist. The look she gives him might kill. Though she knows better than to speak aloud on this.

Asuka gives Lucine an incredulous look first as she claims that Angels do communicate with each other and that they feel things like pain and fear - and communicating with another Angel to get it to stop its pain. Then she just rolls her eyes and sinks back into her seat as she mutters quietly, "The room is full of crazies today. Next she's going to claim she talks with Zeon Zum Deikun in her dreams." Kaworu and Maya though quickly dispel that notion and Asuka just scowls as they entertain the notion she was hearing anything but a fever dream.

Then -=THWACK=-

Asuka was wondering when it'd be used, she just didn't think it'd be used like that. She was half hoping it'd come down on Shinji's desk while he was napping, but him waking up dispelled that.

"For hitting of course." Asuka replies casually to Shinji's exaggerated startle and subsequent question. "Though if you think she was dispensed that by NERV then you're underestimating her."

<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.

The... forcibly-conclusive reaction to that last question and a conclusion to the lecture that feels perhaps slightly too quick stands out to Koji, who while an Oldtype himself has spent enough time around the New to trust Strange Psychic Inference. NERV will be NERV even when sharing its secrets, he supposes.

Still. More than enough to chew over later. He looks over the assembled once more, noting just how strange a collection it is and removing his earpiece as he stands up. "Thank you for sharing this information, Administrator. I doubt it was easy to get it to happen."

And now he has a better sense of what the young pilots Tetsuya regularly deals with are like. That bickering between Captain Langley and the Director's son feels wryly familiar to him, for one thing, but there are different personalities mixed in the formula here too.

Regardless, the former pilot nods to the assembled and heads out of the lecture hall to mull over the things that have been discussed today.

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        It wasn't so long ago that Lucine told Liam her secret--she could hear others' thoughts, and was afraid of what people would think if they found out. He was the one who brought this to NERV's attention, however accidentally, and when she tells of her experience inside Jophiel, he feels something warm in his heart, on top of the worry.

        That warmth dissipates into tension as Maya and Mari unceremoniously shoot Lucine down. The tension turns into something approaching anger as Asuka twists the knife. Is Maya telling the truth? Liam glances sideways at Lucine, and then--cautiously, gently--reaches out to clasp her shoulder. There's still wariness there, but this feels like the correct action.

        "I--" Liam whispers--

        THWACK

        He jumps, his hand tightening. Breathe. Breathe. "I can take you to the cafeteria," Liam says. "If you want to. Ruri, too."

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        ".... I didn't think the second Angel was right there, it's possible that it occurred over a long distance, or..." With each word, her voice's volume begins to soften, until it ends altogether.

        Lucine's eyes travel to Kaworu's face for a moment, confused. She had told him before. They talked.

        No, Lucine realizes. She had read it completely wrong. They had just talked. Kaworu was helping her sort her feelings out. It was a traumatic situation, and he, someone *younger than her*, was playing the part of her emotional pillar.

        And then she had the gall to say it aloud in a meeting. Asuka's reaction is to be expected; Lucine's own father lovingly said the same sorts of things until one look from her mother shut him up.

        Did she... mishear the two Angels? She could have. She must have.
        
        Confusion, anxiety, and doubt flood off her, but it stills as Lucine feels Liam's hand on her shoulder. "... ah, I was mistaken. I apologize."

-=THWACK=-

        It may have ended there, in Lucine's mind, if Mari's comment hadn't hinged on something.

        'An Angel's existence remains a solitary one, walled off from everything except the legacy of what came before them.'

        Lucine had felt the Angel's relief at being acknowledged. It's a lie. It's a lie. _It's a lie._

        The teal-haired pilot looks down as Liam asks if she and Ruri would like to go to the cafeteria. "... I'd like that. I need to get my thoughts together..."