Obligatory Author's Notes:

Hey there, people. :) This chapter took a while to write, but I had fun in the process. Things are starting to get interesting now, so those of you who have pointed out that nothing happened in Rei 1 and 2 should be pleasantly surprised. :)

Oh, as for the title...it's the title of the Evangelion ending credits song. I believe the original version of it was done by Frank Sinatra, but I could be mistaken. Anyway, I've got an mp3 of it, if anyone's interested.

Anyway, enjoy...and, as always, let me know if you've got any comments. :)

Peace, Bart

*********

Rei Ayanami 3 (aka Higher Power 1) Fly Me to the Moon

Rei slept fitfully that night, her dreams haunted by the grotesque likeness of a giant, beating heart. It stood out in the open on a vast, flat gray plane, stretching away to infinity in all directions. Giant arteries sunk into the ground like the roots of a tree, pulsating in rhythm with a steady thumping sound that seemed to come from everywhere, permeating her consciousness.

She was repulsed by it, yet at the same time, a will that was not her own drew her nearer to it, little by little. Vainly, she tried to fight it off, but she could do nothing to thwart her approach.

Her hand reached up as she neared it, her fingers pressing against the warm, sticky tissue. She wanted desperately to run away, but her legs refused to obey her. She felt something--another mind, perhaps--inside her head. Its presence, vast as the emptiness that surrounded her, dwarfed her own.

She felt strangely at one with it. Deep down, she was aware that there was something horribly wrong, but the all-encompassing entity had erased her fear and will to resist.

Her eyes opened, but the thumping continued.

She lay there for a minute, breathing quickly, coming to the realization that the sound in her ears was her own beating heart, and that her mind was once again her own.

Tentatively, as if testing her control, she turned her head to gaze at the small mechanical clock on her bed table. It read 7:56.

Slowly, she sat up, stretched, and climbed out of bed, squinting into the morning sunlight. Pulling on a thick blue shirt and a plain, serviceable set of brown trousers, she headed downstairs to prepare breakfast.

"Good morning, Rei. I was about to go and get you up." Citan was seated at the dinner table behind an empty plate and half a glass of juice.

"Doctor Uzuki," she stated, her tone characteristically flat.

"I made some toast for you. It's in the kitchen if you want it. Oh, and there's some shataya juice in the icebox."

Citan excused himself to go pack their camping supplies soon after she sat down with her breakfast, leaving her alone with her thoughts. As she ate, her mind wandered back to last night's dream. In her experience, a dream as vivid as that almost always had some sort of meaning. The very thought sent a chill through her body.

"Rei?"

She looked up to see Citan at the base of the stairs, carrying two backpacks.

"You ready to go?"

Nodding, she picked up her now empty plate and carried it to the kitchen sink, then took the backpack that Citan handed her. It was dark brown, made out of some kind of rough, woven fabric she didn't recognize. Slipping her arms into it and buckling the waist strap, she bent her knees a few times to test its weight. Despite its large size, it did not seem terribly heavy. Citan's, on the other hand, appeared to be a good bit more burdensome from what she could tell by the way his arms strained as he held it.

With a heave, Citan hoisted it up over his shoulders and adjusted the straps holding it in place. "Shall we go?" he asked, holding the door open.

*

Preston Kinneas loved a challenge.

And the strange, captivating girl with sky-blue hair and crimson eyes certainly presented one. He had only been in her presence for a few minutes, but that was more than enough time for her image to ingrain itself in his mind with startling clarity.

Preston had faced other challenges before. Some young ladies had found his casual, confident attitude irritating. Irritation he could work with. Irritation was *something*. The girl--Rei, her name was--had offered no reaction at all. Those eyes took in everything, and yet revealed nothing.

He couldn't get her out of his head.

>From his seat on the Archaeology building's marble steps, he could see Rei and the doctor approaching from a good distance away. Rei was every bit as marvelous as she had been the previous day, plain camping garb notwithstanding. The doctor was again dressed in green, which suited his calm demeanor somehow.

"'Morning, Doc," he said, standing as the pair reached the stair steps.

"Good morning, Preston."

He turned to the young woman, putting on his most dashing smile, and brushing a stray strand of brown hair away from his face. "Miss Rei."

She just nodded.

This was going to be harder than he thought.

"So," said the doctor, "are you ready to head out?"

"Sure am. We should probably stick around until Kala gets here, though." He glanced down at the stainless steel diving watch his father had bought for him several years ago. "She's got a good ten minutes yet."

Citan adjusted his glasses, perplexed. "Who's Kala?"

"She stopped by my dorm yesterday. Apparently she enrolled in the class late, and didn't find out she was supposed to meet with Professor Tanning until after the meeting."

"Is that her?" asked Citan, glancing eastward.

Preston squinted into the morning sun. Silhouetted against the sunrise was a woman just over five and a half feet tall. The morning sunshine glinted off of coppery wisps of hair swept up by the cool fall breeze. It was difficult to make her features out up against the light, but Preston could tell she was wearing a large backpack.

"Hey!" The girl waved at them as she approached, coming to a stop at the foot of the stairs. She studied Citan for a moment, and then spoke. "You're Doctor Uzuki, right?"

Citan nodded. "Doc's fine. Are you Kala?"

She smiled. "In the flesh." She grasped Citan's hand and shook it firmly, then fixed her eyes on the blue-haired girl beside him. "And you must be Rei," she continued, not quite hiding the curiosity on her face as she looked at the younger girl.

Again, Rei simply nodded. Preston noted that she did that quite a lot.

"Are we all set then?" Citan asked after a brief silence.

"Good to go, Doc." Preston hoisted his pack up over his shoulder.

Kala shrugged. "Ready as I'll ever be."

Rei, unsurprisingly, just nodded.

*

The conversation touched on the weather, intramural sports, troubles with the school administration, favorite composers, and other such trifles as the group hiked southward. Rei paid them scant attention, speaking only when asked a question directly. Her answers, while not snappish, were short and expressionless, and her three companions soon surmised--correctly--that she really had no desire to be included in their conversation. Their journey took them past small farms, vast meadows, scattered deciduous forests, and even a little town or two. Even though she had never been one to care much about looks, Rei had to admit that the scenery was at least marginally pleasing.

"So, Preston," Kala was saying, "Where are you from, anyway?" Kala, while she was mildly intrigued by her and Citan, seemed to have a special interest in Preston for some reason; that suited Rei just fine--it kept him from bothering her.

"It's a little town called Trabia."

Kala shook her head. "I'm afraid I haven't heard of it."

"That wouldn't surprise me," said Preston, smiling. "It's off-world."

This seemed to spark Kala's interest to an even greater degree. "Oh! No kidding! How long have you been here?"

"'Bout a year and a half now, I guess. I really haven't kept track."

"What's it like? Your town, I mean."

Preston ran a hand through his hair thoughtfully. "It's an alright place, I guess. Nothing terribly exciting, but it was a good place to grow up. The funny thing about it is that it was actually rebuilt where an old training ground used to be."

"Seriously?"

Preston nodded. "Yup. My mom trained there as a kid. It got leveled in a missile attack while she was away."

"That's awful," said Kala.

"Well, they had a pretty good bunker--a lot of the people there actually survived it."

"That's good to hear, anyway. Houses can always be replaced... people, on the other hand..."

Rei thought about that statement. Back on Earth, she had been Gendo Ikari's commodity. Replaceable? Certainly. Grown in a tank with a multitude of duplicates of herself, she herself was given life to replace another Rei Ayanami--and she could only assume that, when she left the world, she had been replaced by yet another.

It was a disconcerting thought, surely, but one that defined the core of her existence. Parentless, and in a life devoid of friends, save for Shinji Ikari, she had lived only to pilot Evangelion Unit 00.

She wondered what it would have been like, growing up feeling needed--or even growing up /at all/, for that matter.

"My parents are good people," Preston was saying. "It was hard for me when I first got here... I still miss them, when I think about it too hard."

Kala looked down, embarrassed. "Oh, I'm sorry. We can talk about something else if you like."

Preston gave her his best cute half-smile. "Hey, don't worry about it. It's good for me to talk about them every once in a while."

"You sure?"

"Positive," he replied, nodding resolutely. "My dad's a famous sharpshooter. I guess I've always tried to be like him--never been quite as good as he is, but he's always been proud of me just the same.

"My mom was into martial arts--nunchucks, especially--but she's settled down a bit since I was born. I know they did something really important back when they were my age... they don't talk about it much, though. In fact. I've really only heard them mention it when Uncle Squall and Aunt Rinoa are over."

"Squall? That's a funny name, isn't it?"

Preston shoved his hands into his pockets as he walked. "Yeah, I guess it kind of is. And he's not my uncle, really... just a good friend of my parents. Never met a nicer guy, though. He's just... deeply /happy/, I guess. He's pretty quiet, but he always has a kind word for people, and he's always ready to help you out when you need something. What's weird about it is Dad says he would have never thought Uncle Squall would have turned out like that. Apparently, he was real closed-mouthed and miserable when he was younger. My mom told me Aunt Rinoa was the one who finally turned him around. It's amazing what love is capable of, when you think about it."

Kala was looking up ahead thoughtfully. Rei had not really taken the time to get a good look at her up until now. She was about Preston's age--nineteen or twenty or so. Her hair was long and perfect, tied back in a thick coppery braid that extended midway down her back. She had a friendly, round face that Rei could only assume was quite attractive; and her sparkling brown eyes carried a sense wonder and optimism that was all but gone from the Earth where she had been born.

"How 'bout yourself?" said Preston after a moment's pause. "Where are you from?"

"Ahren," she said, adjusting her backpack as she walked.

"Wow, that's a ways away from here. Across the ocean, right?"

Kala nodded. "It's a ways, yeah, but not quite so far as, say, a different universe."

Preston grinned. "So, what's your family like?"

"Well, my mom and dad and older brother run the family business--it's a shipping company. They do alright. I've also got two younger sisters who still live at home."

"Big family," said Preston, nodding approvingly. "I'm an only child, myself. 'Bout the closest I have to a sibling is little Raine Leonheart. Ya know, come to think about it, I might have a photo in my wallet." Twisting awkwardly to reach around his backpack into his back pocket, he produced a plain leather wallet and opened it up. Rifling through it briefly, he pulled out a small photograph and handed it to Kala.

"Let's see here," he said. "The couple on the left there are my parents, and that kid in between them is me. The other two are the Leonharts... the little girl hugging Squall's leg there is their daughter Raine."

Kala squinted at the picture, trying to make out the faces. "Wow, your dad's really cute. He looks a lot like you. Um, I mean--"

Preston cleared his throat and scratched the back of his neck lightly. "Hey, Rei, we haven't heard much from you... you got a family back home?"

"No."

And that was the end of that particular conversation.

*

The air had cooled somewhat by nightfall, although not so much as to be uncomfortable. Citan built the campfire with the skill of a man who had done so a thousand times before. As he worked, the other three started into their rations, which consisted mainly of jerky, hard biscuits, dried fruit, and water--not the most tasty meal ever made, but better than it sounded anyway.

They spoke as they ate, discussing the day's events and their expectations of the archaeology project. Even Citan, who was easily one of the more mature people Rei had ever encountered, seemed to exude a measure of boyish excitement over the promise of tomorrow's adventure. Only Rei remained silent, much as she always did, thinking of her dark past and uncertain future. She had put the previous night's dream out of her mind as they walked, but it slowly crept back into her thoughts once they had sat down in front of the fire. The heart in her dream was calling for her. A part of her that had always remained hidden before wanted nothing more than to go and become one with it, sinking into its all-encompassing, malevolent consciousness.

It frightened her terribly.

But, on the other hand, wasn't that what she had always wanted? To become nothing by being absorbed into something greater--a way to dissolve the empty sense of self that haunted her very existence?

No. Not like that.

She looked over at Preston, who had taken a seat on the log beside her, holding a small canvas bag. Handing her a thin stick with one end carved to a point, he opened the bag and brought forth a puffy white object. "You've seen these before, haven't you?"

Rei nodded, nonplussed.

"Marshmallows!" Kala, on the other hand, was apparently quite pleased. "Can I have one?"

"But of course!" Gingerly, Preston shook another marshmallow out of the bag and tossed it to Kala.

Preston turned back to Rei. "You know how to roast marshmallows, right?"

Something about his mannerisms made Rei uncomfortable, although she could not quite place her finger on exactly what. His eyes were confident and openly admiring, and she found that his gaze was difficult to meet. She took the marshmallow she had been given and poked the end of her stick through it, which seemed to satisfy him.

"Want one, Doc?" Preston took out yet another fluffy confection and motioned as if tossing it.

"That would be excellent," said the Doctor, holding out an open hand. Catching the spongy projectile deftly, he set it on his lap and opened up a pocket knife, using it to strip the bark off the end of a nearby stick.

Their seats proved to be a bit too far away from the fire to roast their dessert with any measure of accuracy, so the four of them ended up huddled close together around the remains of the fire, Rei's companions talking and laughing quietly as the sweet, gooey smell of cooking marshmallows wafted over them.

Cautiously, Rei withdrew her stick from the fire and pulled the marshmallow off, popping it into her mouth. All in all, it really could have been worse.

*

As Rei soon realized, one of the biggest disadvantages to living in a world where they had yet to synthesize plastic was that tents were still made out of canvas. It rained that night, and occasional drops of cold water leaked through and fell on her face or her sleeping bag. By the time morning rolled around, she was damp and shivering, and her nose had started to run.

The rest of her little archaeology class did not look a whole lot better, save for Citan, who somehow managed to shrug off the chill and dampness like it was nothing. He emerged from his tent soon after Rei did, and began breaking camp without so much as a sniffle.

After a quick breakfast, they pressed onward, Citan glancing frequently at the parchment map as they walked. Their surroundings were a bit more hilly and wooded than they had been yesterday, which drew a few complaints from Kala and Preston. "When you do a lot of travelling on foot," Citan explained to them, "you learn to appreciate varying terrain. Granted, it's more tiresome than walking across a prairie, but there are a lot more landmarks to go by."

He brought the group to a stop and held the map out for the rest of them to see. Wiping the sweat off his brow, he squinted into a thin beam of sun that was just beginning to pierce through the cloud cover.

"See those two hills over there?" He pointed to a pair of heavily-forested foothills off to the west. "Look how the one closer to us is a good bit taller than the other. Now, if you take a look at the map, you can tell that those two hills are the same as the ones right there."

The three of them nodded.

"And that," he continued, pointing at the map, "would put us on the east side of this valley right here."

"So that means the site is just past that bluff there, right?" Kala said, using a hand to shield her eyes from the sun, which was now in full view.

Citan nodded.

"No sense standing around here then, eh doc?" Preston gave Citan a slap on the back, then started off toward their destination with renewed purpose.

*

It was a quarter of an hour later when Kala quite literally tripped over their objective. A set of stone blocks along the ground in a semicircular pattern surrounded the arched entrance to a cavern which had apparently been dug into the steep hillside aeons ago. The entryway itself was large--approximately twenty feet across and at least that high--with the lower half almost completely blocked off by dense foliage.

"I take it this is the spot," ventured Kala, rubbing a bruised toe.

Citan nodded, pulling out the sword that was sheathed on his belt. "That would be a safe assumption."

Rei watched with disinterest as the doctor used his weapon to cut away at the underbrush that obstructed the entrance. Preston and Kala moved in to help him out, using their hands to tear the vegetation away, while keeping a healthy distance from the doctor's swinging katana. Within minutes, the opening was cleared. It stood before them, a disconcertingly dark hole into the hill's sharp slope. The stones around the edge of the archway had begun to crumble in a way that reminded Rei of a photograph of the Great Pyramids she had once seen. It was obvious to her that they had been finely-cut in their time--however long ago that time was.

Pausing for a moment to catch his breath, Citan sheathed his sword and leaned up against the right wall just inside the opening. Preston had, in the meantime, rummaged through his backpack and produced a small hooded lantern. Rei was again mystified by the light source, as it appeared to run without either fuel or electricity. The other three seemed to take it in stride, though, so she decided that it was not important enough to warrant a mention.

The walls of the newly-illuminated cavern appeared to be made of solid steel-reinforced concrete. They had a rough, stony texture and streaks of rust running down them that had come with uncounted years of wear. The air inside was damp and smelled of mildew, and the occasional drip of water fell from the ceiling.

Without waiting for so much as a word, Preston started in.

"Hey, hold up!" Kala placed a restraining hand on his shoulder. "It could be dangerous in there."

Preston Kinneas rolled his eyes. "Yeah, right. This place has been like this for thousands of years. If anything dangerous was here, it probably left a long time ago."

"Still," Citan interjected, "it is always wise to be cautious in a situation like this. I think perhaps I should go first."

Preston let out an exaggerated sigh. "Oh, alright, if you insist. Lead the way, Doc."

Wordlessly, the doctor made his way into the cave. The ground sloped upward slightly, and the condition of the walls improved noticeably as they moved further into the passage.

*

For some reason, Billy Lee Black had a vague sensation of hitting the ground twice before blacking out completely. His first fall had been from a dizzying height of twenty feet, which admittedly isn't terribly dizzying until you're actually falling from it. The second he was unsure about, because the force of the first impact had left him reeling.

But there he was, lying flat on his back with his eyes closed as he slowly came to. His head was absolutely throbbing, and there was a searing pain in his lower right leg. Groaning slightly, he shook his head and opened his eyes, peering owlishly into the sunlight. He was still dazed, and thus unable to bring his vision completely into focus, but from what he could see and hear, he ascertained that he was in a forest somewhere.

Hadn't he been at Citan's house?

Memories of the previous few minutes crept into his mind. He had been investigating a "black box" inside his gear, when he was suddenly surrounded by a purple glow. Too late, he had tried to jump from the gear, only to look back and see the glow spreading up his leg, like a second skin. It was a blur after that. He had fallen, certainly, and hit the ground; he then was vaguely aware of a strange wrenching sensation, followed by another thud.

Rubbing his eyes with his right hand while propping himself on his left elbow, he again glanced at his surroundings. He was definitely nowhere near his gear; and Dan, Fei, and the others were gone as well.

Bringing himself painfully to a sitting position, he wondered for a moment whether he had met the same fate that had befallen Citan. He fought of a flash of dizziness and stood weakly. Taking a deep breath, he adjusted the collar of his overcoat and brushed off the worst of the dirt and fragments of dry leaves that he had accumulated in his brief sleep on the forest floor. The leather strap on his ether gun, slung diagonally across his back, weighed comfortingly on his shoulder. A quick check revealed that both his pistols were present as well--if he was going to be alone in an unknown land, he would at least be capable of defending himself.

Billy took a faltering step and leaned up against a tree, rubbing the back of his head. The lower half of his left pant leg, he noted, was burned rather badly. He bent over and lifted it gingerly; the skin underneath was red and blistered in places. Shaking his head, he wished for a moment that magic was still functioning.

The ground he was standing on was slanted slightly, and he could see rolling, wooded hills through the trees around him. Recalling a bit of advice his father once gave him, he started hesitantly down the slope of the hill. Theoretically, travelling downward in a temperate area would eventually lead to a river, which would in turn lead to a human settlement. His father, although he didn't like to admit it--even to himself, was generally wise, at least as far as this sort of thing was concerned.

His bearings gradually returned to him as he stumbled down toward the valley ahead. He put very little thought into his current situation; he had scant information, and decided that it would be best to expect anything, as opposed to drawing any wrong conclusions.

Billy continued on for a few minutes. He was leaning up against a tree to catch his breath when a dark shape flying low across the sky caught his attention. It was winged and reptilian--vaguely draconian, in fact. Although larger than himself, it was a good bit smaller than any dragon he had seen before.

Ducking behind a gnarled oak tree, he observed cautiously as the creature glided overhead, apparently oblivious to his presence. With a few powerful beats of its wings, it veered to the left and continued on, cutting silently though the air at a mere thirty feet above the treetops.

Once he was certain he was out of the imposing avian's field of view, he continued on, scanning his surroundings periodically for some sign of human life.

*

"Oh my." Citan was the first to round the corner into a large, dark, smooth-walled chamber. Rei could make out a dim glow coming from the room before she actually looked inside, so she was only moderately surprised when she walked into the room and saw that the far wall was lined with computers and other high-tech control devices of varying shape and size. The left wall of the room was home to a huge metal door, the likes of which she had seen used to protect safety deposit boxes at banks.

What was truly startling was what she saw on the right wall--the large, looming shape of what appeared to be a fifteen-foot-tall humanoid robot. She shuddered slightly at the reminder of her experience piloting Evangelion Unit 00. At well over a hundred feet high, frequent contact with the grotesque, wiry bio-machine had dulled what little ability to be awed that she had been born with. Thus, it was with only mild distaste that she turned away, her eyes coming to rest again on the computer equipment at the far wall.

The doctor was already there, musing over the screens and panels, but not yet sure enough of himself to touch them.

"Oh my," he exclaimed again. "Now this is certainly interesting."

"What is it, Doc?" Preston and Kala approached him and peered over his shoulder.

"These controls here...they're written in Galactic Federation Standard."

Kala blinked. "In what?"

"It's the old language the people where I come from used to speak, back when they arrived on the planet ten thousand years ago," Citan explained. "I'm afraid I don't know more than a few words--the vast majority of it has been lost over the course of history."

Preston and Kala nodded, eyeing the electronics with interest.

"English," Rei stated.

The doctor raised an eyebrow. "Say again?"

"These controls. The writing is in English."

Citan was about to inquire as to how Rei was able to read the writing on the panels, but a heavy metallic *thunk* echoed through the chamber before he had a chance to do so. The source of the sound, he noted with dismay, was the large, previously-dormant robot that had been attached to the far wall.

The robot, at a hefty fifteen feet high, was barely large enough to be considered a gear, but was nonetheless frightening. It lurched forward into the light, then caught its balance and stood upright, surveying the room. Its armor plating was rounded, and paint was flaking off in places, revealing a slate-gray metallic sheen underneath.

Now, typically, a machine like this--at least in stories--will glare menacingly at its objective with glowing red eyes, and will then say something to this effect: "Target acquired. Destroy."

Apparently this one had been programmed to skip the formalities, because it simply raised its arm--which had been fitted with some sort of beam cannon--and fired at Citan.

*

The sound, a low rumbling followed by frantic screams, was strangely quiet for something that had come from almost directly below her. Peering down into the forest with eyes that could see a fly at fifty yards, Tempreat determined that the source of the sound was actually the opening of a cave at the base of a nearby hillside. Judging that the mouth of the cave was wide enough to accommodate her wingspan, she tucked her legs in, circled once, and dove downward.

*

Billy could have sworn he heard a scream. Several, in fact. Momentarily forgetting the pain throughout his body, he looked around, suddenly sharp and alert. A sudden chilling shriek, the sound of a massive bird of pray, broke the near silence. Billy started visibly and followed the sound with his eyes. Some hundred feet to his right, the dragon he had seen earlier was swooping down out of the sky. Frightened by the possibility that the wyrm might be about to devour human pray, he broke into a dead sprint toward where the creature had landed.

The underbrush scratched painfully at his already burnt legs, but he barely noticed as he neared the source of the noise. By this time, he could hear the sounds of a fight very clearly--the sounds of humans yelling, along with the dragon's shrill call, punctuated occasionally by what sounded almost like a beam weapon firing.

The mouth of a large, man-made cave appeared in front of him through the trees as he ran; the sounds of battle were almost certainly coming from inside. Leaping over a row of stone bricks, he bounded into the cavern, stumbling slightly. He caught his balance mid-stride and drew his handguns without even slowing.

As he tore through the passageway, he could feel the occasional blast of hot air coming from up ahead. The yelling was louder now, and he was relieved to realize that they were cries of alarm and not of pain. The cave made a sharp corner to the left up ahead, obscuring his view of what was happening. Hoping for the best, Billy steeled himself, rounded the corner, and stopped abruptly with both guns pointed at the dragon. "Freeze!" he yelled.

"You first."

Startled, Billy turned his head to find that he was looking straight down the nose of a loaded crossbow. It's owner, a brown-haired man of about his age, wore a brown surcoat not unlike his own. Feeling another wave of heat, he turned back for a closer look at the dragon. In the quarter second that he had been looking at the battle, it had failed to register on him that the dragon was actually in combat with what appeared to be a small gear. Fighting beside the it, katana in hand, was none other than the missing Doctor Citan Uzuki. A strange, pale girl with light blue hair crouched against the far wall of the cave, and another girl stood near her, moving her hands and chanting in the manner of someone who is casting a spell.

"Doc!" Billy yelled.

Citan made eye contact with him for an instant, but knew better than to let himself be distracted from the matter at hand. Turning back, he lunged sideways and swung his sword at the back of the gear's knee joint. The gear, now alerted to Billy's presence, turned and leveled its beam cannon at him.

"Get down!" The man who had moments ago trained a crossbow on his head leapt toward him and threw him to the ground, just in time to narrowly avoid a beam fired from the robot's gun. The beam instead blasted a sizeable quantity of concrete out of the wall behind him, showering him and his spontaneous rescuer with a painful barrage of sharp rocks.

Meanwhile, the battle raged on in front of him. The dragon was fighting furiously, oblivious to the ugly burn mark on her side that would have been big enough to kill a human. Another uncomfortable wave of heat filled the room as it blasted the gear with a sheet of white-hot fire. The gear raised its arm to shield its face, swinging the other arm blindly at the attacking dragon.

Citan took the opportunity to again slip in with his blade and attack the back of the robot's knee joint, this time drawing a shower of sparks.

"Get off me," Billy grunted, rolling out from under the man who had tackled him seconds earlier. He pulled himself to a stand as quickly as his injured body would allow, and trained his gun on what, given the machine's efforts to shield its face, he surmised to be a vulnerable point--its eyes.

Blocking out the commotion around him, he took aim, and pulled the trigger. The gear spasmed slightly as the bullet entered its right eye with deadly accuracy. Regaining its balance quicker than Billy expected, the gear again trained its beam cannon on him and fired. Billy leapt out of the way just in time to see a smoldering hole blasted into the floor where his feet had been.

Letting out a fierce battle-cry, Citan again lunged for the robot, driving his blade into the back of its already injured knee. The automation stumbled, but managed to keep its footing, knocking the attacking dragon away with both arms. Behind them, the brunette finished her chant and raised her hand in the air, then stopped, startled by the apparent failure of her spell. This came as no surprise to Billy, who had some weeks earlier seen--in fact, helped bring to pass--the end of magic.

The dragon, slightly bleary from the crushing blow it had just taken, shook its head and leapt back into the fight, clawing mercilessly at the gear. Citan, seeing an opportunity, again circled around behind their attacker.

It had been a while since Billy had seen the doctor in a battle; he had almost forgotten just how impressive Citan could be in a fight. Taking a running start, the doctor leapt a nigh-impossible distance upwards, then drove his sword downward into the back of the gear's neck. He had the presence of mind to let go of his sword, which immediately began to seethe with an incredible amount of electrical power.

As the doctor alighted on the ground, the robot came to an abrupt stop, emitting arcs of electricity and a thick cloud of black smoke. This continued for about ten seconds and finally died down to nothing, leaving the body of the robot, now a scorched metallic husk, still standing in the middle of the room.

Breathing a sigh of relief, Citan climbed up the now dead machine once again, finding footholds on its knee and hip joints. When he reached the top of the fifteen foot monstrosity, he pulled his katana from its neck and returned it to his sheath, again leaping deftly ground.

It was then that the humans, now numbering five, looked up at the dragon once again. They drew together warily, backing slowly toward the entrance.

Catching its breath, it let a slow stream of smoke escape from its nostrils, and then spoke: "Ye gods, now saving their lives isn't enough. Next I'll have to wash their clothes."

The wyrm's voice, surprisingly enough, was female; and though deep and serious, it lacked the sinister quality that one imagined would belong to the dragons of legend.

The blue-haired girl stopped and bowed her head. "Thank you," she said quietly.

The dragon regarded her curiously, wisps of smoke again issuing from her nostrils. "At least this one can show some respect," she said finally. "I'm afraid I'll be forced to eat the rest of you, though."

"That was a joke," the dragon added, noting that they had tensed up.

The brown haired man with whom Billy had grappled just moments earlier gave a nervous laugh.

Citan cleared his throat quietly. "Well, I suppose introductions are in order."

The dragon inclined her head and sat down weakly. "My name is Tempreat," she said.

"Citan Uzuki," said the doctor. "Friends call me Doc."

The brown-haired man inclined his head slightly, smiling. "Preston Kinneas. It's a pleasure."

"Kala Tremont." The tall young woman with copper hair spoke with a nervous tremor to her voice, apparently shaken up, either over the presence of a dragon, the failure of her magic, or both.

Finally, Tempreat turned to the younger of the two women, a girl of about seventeen with light blue hair and soulful crimson eyes that spoke volumes and hid even more. "Rei Ayanami," she intoned, again nodding her head.

Billy blinked and looked up at the group; the rest of them, including the dragon, now had their eyes on him.

"Billy. Billy Lee Black," he said, wiping the sweat from his forehead. "Nice to meet you." Overcome by a sudden wave of dizziness, he sunk to his knees, suddenly painfully aware of the scrapes and burns covering his legs.

Doc was beside him in no time, placing a hand on his shoulder. "You feeling alright, Billy?"

"Yeah, I'm okay," Billy replied between pants. "Nothing serious. Just a bit worn out is all. By the way...where are we, Doc?"

"Do you two know each other or--" Preston became silent at the sight of Citan's raised hand.

Citan examined Billy's lower legs closely; the left was burned badly, blistered all over and gray in spots. Most of his ankle was scratched and bleeding in addition to being burned. His right leg was scratched as well, but only slightly red.

"Where are we?" Billy ventured, propping himself up on an arm.

"We're on Nu," Citan replied, as if that explained it.

"Is Nu an island or something?"

"No," Citan answered. "Now, please be quiet for a moment so I can concentrate. I'm not sure whether this will work or not."

Billy did as he was told, and was surprised to see Citan chanting a healing spell. He was even more surprised, when, at the spell's conclusion, the pain in his legs diminished slightly, and his wounds, while still quite serious, seemed to lessen somewhat.

"How did--?"

"Hold still, Billy." Shutting his eyes in concentration, the doctor chanted the spell again. It had a stronger effect this time, eliminating the blisters and scratches almost completely, and reducing the pain to a dull throbbing. Shaking his head wearily, Citan cast the spell one final time and healed the last of the burn. "I'm sorry it took me three attempts to heal you, Billy. The ether is different here, and I'm not quite used to it yet."

"Uh, Doc," Billy said again, "where's Nu?"

The doctor sighed. "You're in another universe, Billy."

"A what?"

"Nu is a nexus of sorts...it's a universe that's connected to an indeterminate number of other universes."

Billy's eyes widened slightly, and he sat up. "We can go back, right?"

"I'm afraid I don't know," the doctor answered. "Rest assured, I'll keep working on a way to do so, but from what I've heard, our chances of actually succeeding are next to nil."

Billy stood up shakily, the strength slowly returning to his body. He looked around quietly, unsure of what to say.

"Nice weapon." The man named Preston nodded approvingly at the handgun that Billy was still clenching tightly.

"Thanks." Billy opened his jacket and placed it back in its holster, then did the same with its mate, which he had dropped on the floor at some point during the battle. "My father gave them to me."

Preston grinned at that. "No kidding," he said. "Maybe I can show you my rifle some time. I don't carry it with me anymore...ran out of ammo before I found out they don't make any here."

Billy listened as Preston, Kala, and Tempreat shared their stories, and then explained his own. The blue-haired girl, whose eyes bespoke a story much more tragic and disturbing than even the dragon's, remained frustratingly silent. When they finally decided to have a bite to eat, Billy edged up to Citan and asked him in a low voice if he knew anything about Rei's origins. He was disappointed to find that the doctor was nearly as ignorant of her past as he was.

"So," Billy said after swallowing a chunk of jerky, "what is all this stuff, anyway?"

Another long explanation ensued, this one about the Archaeology class that the four of them were taking. When asked what it was the machinery in the room was for, the doctor only shrugged, and replied that he was afraid he wasn't sure.

"One way to find out," said Preston, who had been poking around near one of the control panels while Citan spoke. Casually, he reached over and flipped a large switch in the middle of the panel. The computer equipment immediately came to life, and the large metal door on the wall of the room opened without a sound. They looked at the opening curiously; the door appeared to open up to a solid concrete wall. Finally, it began to emit a low humming noise, and a thin, silvery sheen formed in the air just inside the door.

A room much like the one they were standing in came into view through the door, gradually superimposing itself over the stone wall. Preston approached it slowly, nodding when Citan warned him to be careful. Taking his crossbow from the hook on his belt, he pushed it into the door. Surprisingly, it did not come into contact with the stone, which was still partially visible behind the image of the room. He continued cautiously, until his right arm was in through the opening up to the elbow.

"Preston," said Citan, "perhaps you should--"

Ignoring the doctor, Preston closed his eyes and stepped all the way through the door.

His hand exploded.

Or, at least, that was what it felt like. The tattered remains of the digital watch his father had bought for him fell to the ground, leaving a burn mark on his left wrist, where it had shorted.

"Yeow!" he cried out in a mixture of pain and shock, clutching at his arm and dropping his crossbow.

Pausing to catch his breath, he looked around. Behind him was the door he had just passed through, and, through a silvery sheen, he could make out Billy, the dragon, and his three classmates, all staring incredulously at him.

He motioned for them to follow.