2010-08-07 - The Limits of Man

A Zoid officially registered to A-LAWS does not often take the opportunity to hail the Argama and request permission to land. Then again, the Zoid's pilot also specifically asks for Amuro Ray and expresses the sentiment that this is something akin to a humanitarian mission. The pilot speaks so boredly and coldly and tersely that it's an hour before she's taken seriously. She's patient. She just maintains a holding pattern and waits.

Eventually, Amuro Ray is contacted, various hoops are jumped through, and when the Zoid touches down in the hangar bay, it's met by a few armed Rick Diases ready to push it right back out at the first sign of a false move. No such false move ever comes. The Leostriker's weapons are disabled, and it comes to rest on its belly, dipping its chin low in a position not unlike a lazy nap.

From the belly of the best, then, a pair of figures emerges. Both wear outdated EFA normal suits -- the kind you might find on a colony back during the One Year War, outdated and obsolete. One of them is tall and male and being dragged, his back on the ground, a pair of small hands hooked under his shoulders. The other, petite and female, is doing the dragging, which requires considerable effort to coordinate even in the low gravity.

The hangar door closes, and the atmosphere returns. Gently setting the man's body down, the smaller pilot removes her helmet, revealing a sloppy blue pageboy haircut and a vacant crimson stare. Her arms drop to her side as she waits. The Rick Diases above her don't faze her in the slightest.

The young man currently resting on his back at the girl's feet does not move. It could be said that the Rick Diases do not faze him either. Then again, his prone position on the floor could also indicate that nothing can faze him, ever.

With blue eyes half-lidded, Johnny Domino stares blankly at the ceiling of the hangar. He is breathing, he is warm, and... he is dead to the world.

Amuro Ray is, indeed, eventually contacted. He was in his quarters, staring at a wall while his hands worked on some bit of code for the stolen partial psycommu system blueprints. Eventually, after about 30 seconds of beeping, he allows his Haro to answer the message from the hangar.

"Huh," he grunts. "Sure. Why not."

The Newtype rises, stretching and yawning, wincing as the yawn pulls at the swollen skin around his eye, pulls on his rumpled ARMY jacket and heads out into the hall. Haro follows, uncharacteristically silent.

It takes a bit to get from the gravity block down to the hangar, but the delightful system of automated handles zipping along the walls means that the journey is at least not an arduous one.

And so he arrives, looking up at the Rick Diases, down at the Zoid-- Zoid? Really?-- and further down at the two normal-suited figures. He frowns, then kicks off the wall and floats down towards them.

It is only when he's close enough to recognise the frail frame, and the lengthy frame being dragged, that he sighs again. "Just what I need," he mutters, touching down and hop-skipping over. "Rei" -2 he adds, mentally. "I take it Johnny hasn't woken up yet, then."

When Amuro Ray gets close enough, Rei Ayanami's eyes fix on his. It's a curious thing: to be both hauntingly familiar with someone, and yet to be meeting them for the first time. Rei's unblinking stare shares with Amuro things that nearly no one else could ever hope to understand -- a private bond that will never be commented upon, simply shared between its participants, for better or for worse.

"Johnny is broken, Amuro," Rei says, without looking down at the broken party. "He needs help."

Though Rei's voice is flat and cool, betraying no sentiment or, to be honest, humanity to most who might hear it, there's a certain feeling that Amuro can tease out of her, beyond even the benefit he has of being a Newtype. It's an expectation -- a hope that Amuro is just going to pull out his magic wand and tap Johnny on the forehead with it.

It is as Rei Ayanami put it - Johnny Domino is broken. But how broken is he really? Being broken is not an absolute state. There are levels of brokenness, some more serious than others. In their time together, Ayanami had glimpsed some of the symptoms that have afflicted Domino due to his fractured psyche, but those glimpses were, quite frankly, shallow experiences.

If there's one thing that can be said about Newtypes, it's that they aren't shallow. Not when it comes to other humans.

As Johnny lies snug and tight inside his suit -- a little too snug and tight, as the additional EFA uniform Rei scavenged for him was not Domino's optimal size -- some of the aforementioned Newtypes in the area will be able to tell that the young man on the floor is exuding very little. There is neither a hint of a mental pattern nor the shadow of an emotional activity.

Sleeping people still let off colorful emotions, as befits their dreams. Similarly, unconscious people, at the very least, have the decency to emanate a mental signature, or a mental presence, so to speak. They are there and their mind is still active, even while the body refuses to cooperate.

Johnny Domino is none of these things. And yet, neither is the young man an empty shell. He is filled with something, something unrecognizable. This something can't be comprehended with a simple look, nor by a closer, more critical look. In fact, the closer one would attempt to peer into what fills Domino, the more horrifying the truth becomes.

Johnny is filled with something vast. Trying to look at it up close and personal would be akin to an ant crawling on the back of a whale, attempting to glean its nature. And somewhere, in all of that, lost within these folds, is Johnny Domino.

For the most part, Amuro only pulls out his magic wand for attractive women around his age. If Rei was hoping to see that today, she'll be disappointed. Fortunately for everyone, she's probably thinking metaphorically in this case.

In reply, Amuro grunts and crouches down. He grabs Johnny's shoulder and shakes it, flopping the young Agent around in the low gravity. "Hey," he says. "Wake up, Johnny. I don't have time for this."

Magic

He sighs, straightening again. "Alright, let's get him inside. He looks like shit." Amuro narrows his eyes. "So do you. I won't even ask what you've been up to."

For now, here in the hangar, surrounded by his subordinates and allies, Amuro Ray does not try to delve into Johnny Domino's byzantine mind. It wouldn't do for The White Devil, symbol of defiance, to be seen rolling around on the ground puking his guts out and sobbing, after all. "Come on, Rei," -2, he adds in his head. Leans down grabs Johnny's arms. "Get his legs."

This is really the last thing he needs right now.

It is as Amuro Ray put it - Johnny Domino looks like shit. But how much shit does he look like, really?

Well, let's put it this way.

Rei Ayanami should never be allowed to have pets. Not even plants.

Not even a Haro.

Well.

Rei was hoping that Amuro shaking him would do the trick, really.

There's a lot that the young woman doesn't understand about Newtypes and how they work, but she knows that Amuro is able to fix things. Being young and relatively inexperienced with how the world works when it's not controlled by Gendo Ikari, Rei has no idea what the extent of Amuro's capability is, but the link they share is enough to make the girl put her confidence in him. She doesn't know who else to turn to, anyway.

And when Amuro says that she looks like shit, Rei doesn't comment. She knows she looks like shit. There's not anything to be done about that now. And when he says that he won't even ask what she's been up to... again, she doesn't volunteer anything. Ask Rei Ayanami no questions, and she tells no lies.

She does, however, do as Amuro requests. Rei takes up Johnny's legs, and it's clear when they lift that she is not as strong as the /other/ Rei, the one Amuro made his bizarre pact with. She grunts, despite herself, from the effort of carrying the comatose Agent. This is the closest he has come thus far to 'expressing any kind of relatable human emotion.'

That said, Rei nonetheless is able to pick up on the fact that Amuro is too busy for this nonsense. She can feel that along a certain empathic channel, a broadcast that few, if any, others transmit to her. "I -- hgh -- apologize," she says, sounding robotic, something that might seem insincere to anyone else.

Johnny Domino, despite what Rei Ayanami's grunting may lead one to believe, is actually rather underweight. Which is what happens when Domino is forced to eat nothing but baby food for a number of weeks while in deep space.

At the very least, he does not resist when the two carry him through the Argama. Granted, by the same token, Domino also offers no cooperation... but that doesn't matter much. Amuro Ray is strong enough to handle this, right?

Right?

After a couple minutes of hopscotch-- it's telling about their unique bond that Amuro and Rei don't need to speak to keep time in their zero gravity dance-- they troupe arrives at an open room in the gravity block. Grunting with the strain that gravity adds to carrying a guy, Amuro deposits him on the spartan bunk and sits back, leaning on the desk nearby.

"Give me a minute to catch my breath," he asks, huffing a little from the exertion. "You don't need to apologise, Rei" -2. "I don't know why you're stuck taking care of this guy, but, uh, it's clearly out of your, you know, league. So." Amuro pinches the bridge of his nose, squeezing his eyes shut. This causes another jolt of pain in the black eye, but he ignores it. "I'll see what I can do. No, uh, no promises."

Without the mask of Cinco Budenda, Amuro's behaviour is markedly less confident and swaggering than it was in the A-LAWS. He's more... human, now. Human, and tired.

Once Johnny has been set down onto the bed, Rei's body seems to go slack. She's been in all kinds of gravity situations over the past few weeks, and it seems like he hasn't had time to properly acclimate to any of them. She grips one end of the bed and uses that to steady herself. She, too, needs a minute to catch her breath; she just does her best not to let anyone know.

Her eyes fix on Amuro again. Without the sunglasses, without the uniform, with sleeves... Rei isn't sure she knows what to feel about this. Amuro isn't a superhero, and she feels faintly stupid now. Indecision is unlike her, and regret even moreso, but after weeks of blind faith she suddenly comes to question her own decision. Did she make the right call, putting all her eggs in this basket?

That grappling isn't written on her face, even in the slightest. Instead, she walks over to Amuro. Rei has learned over the years, largely through Leo making a concerted effort to teach her, how to respect the concept of personal space. But right now she does not do that, getting right up close. "Thank you, Amuro," she says, in her vaguely sad monotone.

No, he's not a super hero. That much is for sure. But as he smiles at this new/old Rei with a strange kind of fondness, maybe there's something there after all. He ruffles her hair absent-mindedly, then looks away from her blood-red eyes and straightens. "Well, let's see what we can do, then."

No, not a superhero. But he is a good man.

Leaning over the bunk, he deftly unclips Johnny's helmet and tosses it aside. It clatters into the corner of the room, and he puts the back of one hand on the Agent's forehead. Frowns. Not /sick/, then... just... broken, as Rei said. He's never seen anything like it.

Well, that's not entirely true. The White Devil is no stranger to things like mind control and alien (or angelic?) possession. There's something here... something familiar about the whole situation, that echoing /wrongness/ inside the young man's frail body.

Amuro reverses his hand, putting his palm on Johnny's forehead, and closes his own eyes. He begins to count, emptying his mind. He gets to ten before a thought sneaks in. He banishes it, starts the count over.

It takes two minutes, but he gets to 30, that magic number, without a single thought entering his mind.

And the room /shifts/.

HERE

The ephemeral Amuro awakens, surrounded by the soft colours of the other here. There, across from him, is a tangled mass of twisting cables, flowing moebius loops of strange characters writhing over each other in the form of Johnny Domino's body.

"What..." he say/thinks, puzzled. "What the hell is..."

He reaches out, drifting forwa

HERE

Amuro Ray appears to be having a seizure.

'Shock' is not an emotion that Rei Ayanami handles well; or, rather, she just doesn't seem capable of displaying it quite so readily as her fellow beings. She waits patiently while Amuro does his thing (somehow, she understands it, and doesn't need clarification), but when he starts to shake and seize, her eyes widen to the point where it could almost be considered 'a facial expression.'

"Amuro," Rei says, firmly but calmly, as if he were simply in need of someone to pull him back on track. "Amuro," she repeats, when that doesn't work. Finally, realizing the futility of it, Rei reaches out to grab at Amuro's shoulders and shake him. "Amuro!" she says, sharply, one of the few times in her short life when an exclamation point has been truly warranted.

Amuro Ray performs his dark magic. Johnny Domino permits it.

Indeed, he permits it... right up until Rei begins calling out Amuro's name. Domino's eyelids flutter, as if undergoing a rapid seizure of their own, before snapping open. There's an audible, wheezing intake of breath, and Johnny comes to life.

The young man sits up. He does not push his body upwards using his arms, nor does he struggle to bend his waist into its upright position. Considering the state of his muscles and the low gravity environment, this display of strength and flexibility should /not be possible/. Or at the very least, highly unlikely.

But there is Johnny, sitting on his bed, back and legs straight, staring in Rei Ayanami's general direction.

The expression, or non-expression, on the young man's face should be familiar to Ayanami by now. The voice that escapes through Johnny's lips, too, is familiar. But not in a good way.

"Amuro Ray," Domino utters, low and empty.

And in the other here, the Argama of else, the form of Johnny Domino does the same. It sits up, head turned in the general direction of the ephemeral Amuro. A disembodied voice utters, "Amuro Ray."

"You are limited, Hero of the One Year War." Both in the real world and in no-man's land, these words are spoken through Johnny's form. To Rei, they are nothing but dry words. To Amuro, they are an echo -- a cacophony of fragments.

"You will come to know us," another audible intake of breath, "in the future. We have seen it. But you are limited. Dreams, the way you dreamed them."

"Wake up. This not a dream."

There's a flash of light. It happens in the other place, where only Amuro can see. And the next thing, the tangled mass of twisting cables, the flowing moebius loops, the strange characters, these things are no longer restricted to Johnny Domino's form. They are everywhere. They throb in the walls, they curve through the floors, they comprise every square inch of the Argama. Every person on the ship, every robot, is rendered in this bizarre display. And outside, the fabric of space, as well...

In reality, there is nothing. Only Johnny, Rei, and Amuro, occupying a dull room.

"Amuro Ray," Domino repeats the name. "This is a message from," and suddenly Domino stops short. He tries again, "This is a message from," only to stumble in the same place as before. A line that Johnny has delivered to Rei Ayanami on a number of occasions, yet for some reason fails to complete it when facing Amuro Ray.

Finally, after a moment's hesitation, Domino manages: "This is a message from every time."

"Fly."

And the ephemeral Amuro Ray will be gently nudged, pushed backwards, guided by what feels like tiny invisible hands, countless in number. He is being directed back into his body, before he ventures too close to the proverbial sun and is burnt. If only he was allowed a few moments longer in the presence of Domino's bizarre form -- there was something about it. Something so familiar. Something that Amuro Ray has never forgotten, but that he can't remember.

If only he could have spent a few moments longer.

In the real world, the here and now, Johnny Domino's blue eyes roll in their sockets. He loses consciousness, body succumbing to the low gravity.

His name is spoken from every direction at once. The serpentine ribbons of... what? Data? They surround him, they surround everything. He has never seen or felt or heard or experienced anything like it, and he feels fear. Both for himself, and for everything else.

"Wh, what's going on?" he whispers. "Is this... what sent the Angels??"

Whether it is or not, the insisting tugging, pushing, urging of those unseen wardens gradually forces him out of the trance state, in towards his body. He reaches out, not so much struggling as wondering. "Wait! What have you done with Johnny?!"

His corporeal body repeats these words as his eyes snap open, fixing on Rei. He reaches up, pushing her hands off his shoulders and swiftly turning to the bed. "Message from every time? Fly? What do you mean! ANSWER ME, GOD DAMN IT! WHAT IS GOING ON?!"

Amuro is rarely in a temper these days; the sight of him angrily shaking the comatose Agent is uncharacteristic at the least.

Rei is as helpless as she's ever been, the past couple weeks. There's much in the world that she doesn't understand, and even more beyond it. This falls into that category. When Johnny speaks -- addressing Amuro -- she listens, but can't crack the code. The technology of her mind is simply not up to the task.

Then Amuro shoves her away and Rei stumbles backward. Still not completely used to the gravity, she tries to catch herself, and fails, landing on her bony rear and watching blankly as Amuro begins to shout and shake Johnny. She has no words that seem appropriate for what's happening.

So Rei just sits there, looking on, helpless.

Johnny Domino says nothing. His body jerks to and fro, manhandled under Amuro's harsh treatment, but to no avail.

Domino does not live here anymore. Neither does the entity, or entities, which spoke through him.

After a while, Amuro stops shaking Johnny. Clearly that tactic isn't working. And he can't get into the... thing's mind, either. With a frustrated sigh, he slumps back into the desk and looks up at the ceiling. After a moment of that, he reaches up and rubs his non-bruised eye, and sighs again.

"Something, uh, really... weird is going on here," he mutters, loud enough to be heard if one is listening. Then: "Alright. Alright, okay. Fine."

"Rei, you two are staying, uh, staying /here/ for a while, until we can, you know, get a... a handle on this... /situation/." Amuro straightens, then attempts to straighten his jacket. "You'll be under guard, but, uh, nobody's going to, uh, hurt either of you. I promise." He rubs his thumb and fingers across his forehead, clearly annoyed. "This is some... some heavy stuff. But, uh, we'll do whatever we can."

Rei slowly stands up in her place. Amuro says to stay /here/, and so she doesn't advance even a half-step in any direction. She's always been pretty bad about taking things literally. "Acknowledged," the blue-haired girl mumurs, voice distracted and quiet -- moreso than usual.

This might be because Rei isn't looking at Amuro. Her stare is fixed entirely on Johnny, as if the Agent were a Magic Eye picture -- stare long enough and the answer will reveal itself.

After a few long moments, Rei turns her face toward Amuro. "May I contact my b..." The question dies before the last word can finish. Rei chastises herself internally. It's easier to speak freely (or what passes for freely, with Rei) around Amuro, and she's not sure she's one hundred percent comfortable with that. "May I contact Leo? I don't want him to worry about me."

Amuro grunts. "So you're still together, eh?" His voice is ambivalent. "Just make sure he treats you right, okay? Just because you're not exactly human doesn't mean you don't have human rights." He blows out a breath. "You deserve a guy who'll respect you, after everything you've been through."

It's not a judgement call on Leo; he honestly doesn't know the boy very well any more. It's been a long time since the Gundam Fight, and since the rumours before that. It's been a long time since he spoke with that eager boy about the difference between the pilot and the machine. He hopes Leo took that much to heart, at least.

"Alright, I need to get some rest or see the nurse or something. I've got a, uh, a pounding headache." Amuro opens the door. "Washroom's down to the right there..." he pauses, looking back at Rei. "It's, you know, communal. So make sure none of the boys are in there when you go take a shower." He almost smiles or chuckles, it's hard to say which, but the joviality never reaches the surface. "I'll, uh, have someone come in to keep an eye on Johnny, so once they get here you're free to, uh, use the gravity block as you'd, as you'd like. But don't, don't leave the area."

Rei nods, once, in a sharp military gesture of compliance. "Acknowledged," she says. That's it, though -- no comments rising to Leo's defense, no concern for Amuro's headache, no questioning whether or not the comment about the showers was a joke or not. Her attention simply turns back to Johnny, and then she waits, standing perfectly still.

Amuro pauses, perturbed, in the doorway. She's so familiar, and yet so different. More human in some ways, but so, so much less in others.

He loosk back at her one more time.

Was it worth it, Stenbuck?

Was your booty call to the afterlife worth Rei-3's life?

Amuro hopes so, but only time will tell. Sighing again, he leaves.