Training for a Lost Soul

[Fredrex00]

Within the forest on the Floating Island, sits a open, plain area. Battle scars are etched into the land thanks to many battles and training sessions being conducted there. There were multiple boulders and rocks that had crumbled from a mountain, all ranging in sizes. There was absolutely no plants in the somewhat circular area, all had burned up from attacks from battles or training.

Through the thicket of forest that bordered the grounds, the machine called Burning Gundam forces himself through. Scanning the area for a few seconds, the Gundam looks behind him and motions for Shinji to follow him.

The two walk towards the center of the area, Burning Gundam with his arms crossed. Looking around again, he laughs, "This is perfect!"

Turning towards Shinji he says, "Here. This is going to be the spot where we train." Once more, he scans the area, admiring the location he picked. He stops, suddenly thinking about the younger fighter. "Are...are you sure you want to go through with this?" he asks the Evangelion, "You can back out now. But if you do go ahead, there is NO running away."

Domon looks at the Evangelion, giving a stern look to the young "man", driving home that he meant what he said.

[Azure_Ghidorah]

Shinji smile underneath the helmet.

"Yeah, I'm ready, and I'm certain of going forward now... after all the help you and O'Malley already gave me..."

one of the Eva's hands clenched into a fist.

"I'm stronger then that now... I'm over running away..."

The smile hidden underneath his helmet widened.

"Besides... there's nothing to run away from now... There's no need to turn back. I'd be shaming everybody who relied on me back home if I backed down now."

Shinji then nodded, whether to himself or to Domon was left up to interpretation and finished.

"We've got that out of the way now. How will we begin, Sensei?"

[Fredrex00]

Burning Gundam then nods in approval and looks around the area. "Now...what to start with...." he mutter to himself.

He spots a boulder that was twice the height of the Gundam. "Ah! Perfect!" While motioning to the Eva, Domon speaks, "I want to see you unleash all your strength. Destroy that boulder with ALL your might. No holding back."

Standing with his arms crossed, he waits for the Eva to obey the command. This'll tell me how long we must push to have the full potential of this young man to bloom...

(blah...this post was horrid >.<)

[Azure_Ghidorah]

Shinji glanced at the boulder, of which was twenty feet tall. He grew a bit worried at first, that he wouldn't meet the Gundam's expectations... and crushed that worry when he felt that, depending on how one looks at it, no expectations were set, for this was merely a test.

Emboldened by this, the amethyst Eva nodded to Domon, before walking up to the boulder and preparing himself for the punch he was about to unleash.

"YAAAAH!" he screamed, throwing his fist at the boulder with everything he had, just as instructed. He was pleasently surprised to find that it flat out shattered under the full force of his punch, the numerous shards flying a few feet away before bouncing against the ground.

"... Whoa..." was all Shinji could come up with to voice his surprise.

[Fredrex00]

"Haha! Very good!" the Gundam says, clapping for the Eva. Scratching his chin as he walks up to the purple beast, he speaks, "Not the best form, but not the worst. Needs some improvement." Turning around, spotting an even bigger boulder, this one twice the size of the previous boulder.

The Gundam slowly walks towards the gigantic rock he turns his head to the Eva. "Now, to show you what you can learn from me..." he speaks, stopping in front of the boulder. Cracking his knuckles, he continues, "Before, you only learned instinct, acting based on natural habits. Now, I'll teach you to control your inner strength."

Clenching his fist, his arm trembles as he moves it in front of himself. The fist begins to shine with energy as he continues speaking. "How to ignore your anger....your hatred. The negative emotions that drives negative power!"

As the Gundam slowly opens his fist, energy begins to crackle between the fingers. The sparks fly up into the air and hit the ground, disappearing as fast as they appeared. Slowly, the Gundam's hand begin to turn orange, steam slowly rising from the hand.

"Forcing to find that inner drive within you that isn't anger or hatred. AND USING IT...!!"

The G Gauntlet then shooting over his hand which had now burst into orange flames and the wings on his back folded open, an orange ring igniting from the open wings. "TO ITS FULLEST POTENTIAL!!!!"

Domon smashed his glowing hand straight into the rock, almost instantly vaporizing it into particles of dust. A wave of energy emits from his hand, annihilating anything else that stood behind it. As the wave of energy dissipated, flames created by the blast surged up from part of the grassy area behind the once present boulder.

Turning around to his pupil, his hand still steaming, he gives his orders. "We'll start sparing today. We'll improve on the areas needed the next day. After that sparing, then training, and so on so forth. We shall intertwine hand to hand and weaponry every other sparing day."

As his hand cooled down, Domon stands in front of his pupil. "Now...attack whenever you are ready." he says, not putting up any defenses at all.

[Azure_Ghidorah]

'He... can't be serious, right? Sure, he could probably take me down easily if his power is any indication, but even so he seems to be too relaxed... he might have something planned...' Shinji thought, trying to figure out his sparring opponent.

The air just in front of the Eva unnoticably shimmered as Shinji raised his AT Field, before charging in with a simple punch at Domon's face.

The Gundam deftly avoided with little to no effort, grabbed Shinji's fore arm and used the Eva's momentum to flip him over his shoulder and on to the floor, before going for a quick jab. Domon was minorly surprised when his fist bounced off of Shinji's AT Field, the hexagonal barrier flashing into existance on impact.

But, like the trained warrior he was, such an obstacle didn't keep him off guard for too long, and he was able to jump to the side when Shinji pulled his knife out and swiped, the action taking far too long to ever hope to catch Burning Gundam at this point.

"damnit," Shinji cursed to himself as he scrambled back to his feet, replacing the knife that clearly wouldn't help any more then his fists would.

'I couldn't hope to scrape him at this rate... he's... he's too well trained, trained to fight intelligent opponents, not mindless monsters... The only reason I beat Kaworu when he took over Unit 02 was because he wanted me to win...'

To be honest, despite Domon's training, Shinji had hoped the AT Field would stun him for a bit longer then it did, now he couldn't rely on that to try and get a quick hit off because he doubted that the Gundam would be caught off guard twice.

The Eva's eyes narrowed as he started to charge again, Domon again showing little sign of prepping any defenses. Shinji prayed this would work as anything else at this point would probably hurt him more then it would Domon. The Eva feinted to the left as he got in range, trying to kick Domon this time. Again the Gundam was able to evade his inexperienced pupil's attack, it was slow and easily spotted as it raised to lash out.

"damn..." Shinji muttered again. He was just wasting his energy at this rate, Domon was too experienced to be caught off guard by such tactics, not with how long it took him to launch the attack. His only hope right now was to deflect or evade the Gundam's own attacks and try to hit him in the split second window of opportunity.

With this in mind, the Eva backed into a defensive stance, AT Field still raised.

[Fredrex00]

"Hmph! Stupid fool!" Domon snaps at his young student, rushing forth towards the A.T. Field. The Gundam reared back a fist to strike at the field, causing Shinji to brace for impact. But there was no attack delivered from the front, but from behind. Quickly appearing behind the young pilot, he readies a hand chop to the Eva.

Shinji, reacting to this, points his Progressive Knife at the Gundam to slash at him. In a blinding flash, Burning Gundam draws his beam saber and counters Shinji with his own weapon. With one motion, the Gundam knocked the knife out of the Eva's hands.

Before the Eva could react, Domon delivers a hand chop to the back of Shinji's neck. While it was a small tap to the back of the neck, the young man felt like he was hit by a truck at full speed. Falling to his knees, the Eva pants in pain.

"Don't EVER rely on a single weapon! Utilize ALL your techniques for your success in battle!" the mentor scolds his student, "Now....lets do that again"

The Gundam once more, letting himself be open for the Eva to attack him.

[Azure_Ghidorah]

Shinji sighed, he figured it was best to get this acrossed to Domon now.

"Don't ask me why, but that's the only thing an Eva can carry with it at all times, everything else was supplied by the base they were kept in back home. Unless we suddenly get transported there and the proportions are fixed, that knife was all I had for weapons aside from the AT Field. Without those, all I have are my fists and feet. Right now, I don't have anything fancy to work with..." the pilot explained. He then smirked when he noticed an opportunity.

"However... I can learn fast when I absolutely have to..." Shinji trailed off, then lashed out with his foot, sweeping Domon off of his own feet. The Eva made use of the short window that little manuver granted him, kicking the gundam solidly in the face before Domon could recover. Shinji scowled, springing to his feet and jumping at the now air borne Burning Gundam. Howling, Shinji swung an ax kick down at Domon. The mentor, however, was able to evade this, using Shinji's own foot as a hand hold to pull himself out of the way in what was likely a stunt that few others, if any, could pull off.

Eva and Gundam landed on their feet, the former charging at the latter and attacking. Domon once again easily parried the blow, but this assault was different. This time, Shinji didn't let up after a failed attack, but threw another punch, and another, each one varying in how close it got to actually hitting Domon.

However, the effort was for naught, none of his punches made contact now that the Gundam had stable footing again. Domon parried another punch, and then threw the Eva over his shoulder again with the momentum of the attack, elicting a grunt from Shinji on impact.

"damnit!" the pilot cursed, getting to his feet again as the lights representing his eyes flared. Shinji let off a slight pant again, this one from his exertion. He didn't take long to recover though and pressed on, winding up for another punch. Yet again Domon's skill was shown as he diverted the punch from its original target. Shinji, however, lashed out with a foot and hit Domon's shin enough to shift the gundam, hopefully putting him off balance for the next swing that was coming in.

No good, the induced shift in stance wasn't enough to bother the more skilled warrior, and the follow up was blocked just as easily as its predecessors were.

'If this next one doesn't work, I'm out of ideas...' Shinji thought as they locked. The Eva suddenly pulsed his AT Field, shoving Domon back a few steps. The gundam was nailed in the face again as Shinji lunged immediately, taking advantage of the split second opening in his mentor's defence. The Eva lashed out again, this time hitting Domon in the 'stomach.' Had he been human and not in the form of his mech, such a strike would have had more effect, but not now.

Shinji had a momentum going now, and wasn't about to let his opponent break it, striking again and again at Domon. The Gundam, however, didn't back up at all from the assault, recovering enough to end the Eva's combo two or three punches after the second one, kneeing Shinji and dropping him to his knees again from pain.

'damnit... this is a lot harder then I first thought it would be... I doubt I'll be able to hit him again after that, those last few were probably just flukes. Still... I can't just give up, I've got too much riding on finishing this training... I want to be stronger... I have to get stronger...'

On will alone now, the Eva rose again, AT Field pulsing now in a circular motion, having learned his lesson from Domon striking from behind.

'I may never have had a chance to beat him, but damnit I'm going to do everything I can to try!' Shinji asured himself, staring down Domon again, despite the gundam having a whole foot of height over him.

[Fredrex00]

"Oh ho...you think your only weapons are just the physical method eh?" the Gundam says, scratching his chin. Casually walking up towards the field, looking over how Shinji set up his defenses. "Interesting...your field seems to block almost all attacks....very interesting..." the Gundam remarks.

Standing only a foot in front of the A.T. Field, the Gundam stops his analysis of the shield. "But..you've left yourself open..." the Gundam remarks. Shinji looking confused, is distracted as Burning Gundam delivers a giant punch to the field. The force of the attack makes the ground rumble, and Shinji almost loose balance.

Suddenly, from above, Domon descends towards his pupil, landing behind him in the process. Once again, he gives a hand chop to the head of Shinji. The pupil falls to his knees as the rush of pain courses though his body.

"Your weapons aren't only your physical ones...but also your mind young one." Domon says to his pupil, "Disengage your shield. We're taking a break for a while." The Gundam crosses his arms, waiting for his pupil to obey his orders.

[Azure_Ghidorah]

"Alright..." Shinji muttered as the A.T. Field flickered, before receding back to his body.

"Well... I know I didn't do very good, but I was at least decent in combat, right?" the pilot asked, picking himself up with a wince and walking over to retrieve his knife, replacing it in the shoulder pylons.

"Or maybe I wasn't... Regardless, we'll fix that over time..." he finished, walking back towards Domon.

[Fredrex00]

Shaking his head and sighing, Domon takes a seat on the ground with his arms crossed. "So serious..." the Gundam mutters, "You need to relax when you train. If your tense all the time, you'll get no where..."

He motions for the Eva to take as seat as well, wanting him to relax before they got back to training. "Take a seat and tell me your story young one. Then, I shall tell you mine.", the Gundam says, his arms still crossed.

[Azure_Ghidorah]

Shinji sighed, Domon had a point about relaxing when training, such was blatantly clear.

Mentally turning back to all the years past, he felt he could trust the Gundam, and started recounting the events of his, comparatively, short life, his mother's death at four years of age, his father's abandonment days later, the note sent by his estranged father, the battles against the angels to prevent there goal of Third Impact, and what he remembered about the end of it all.

"... Once Unit 01 finally activated and I could get out... Asuka's Eva was already just a mangled, hideous corpse... I... I guess I freaked out... I don't really know what happened after that, until I found myself dropping in here..." the boy finished, head hanging slightly.

"My best guess is that my father must've done what the Angels were intending to do, but in a fashion that allowed him to control what happened..." Shinji added as an after thought, shaking his head.

He looked up to Domon, waiting for the Gundam to share his story, now that he had detailed his.

(OOC: Again, Lazy post is lazy, but this was getting stagnent for too long)

[Fredrex00]

A small pause is heard before Domon speaks. "You...are much like myself," he says to the young man, "As I told you before, I too was used and betrayed by the people I trusted. When I was a young man like yourself, I had my mother die thanks to the greed of my military. They wanted to posses the machine my father created called the Ultimate Gundam. My brother, Kyouji, fled with the Ultimate Gundam to Earth. When it landed on Earth, the Ultimate Gundam malfunctioned and became a demon that wished to vanquish all human life to rebuild Earth once again. It absorbed Kyouji, using him as a fuel source. Since they failed to gain the power of the Ultimate Gundam, they placed my father under cyrostasis to keep him from talking. They also relabeled the Ultimate Gundam, The Devil Gundam

"The Neo Japan government then made a bargain with me: Fight and kill Kyouji and they would free my father from prison. I took the offer, wanting to regain my family. Along the way, I met many fighters who joined my side as well as my Master who I had to fight, and who died after defeating him. Soon after that, The Devil Gundam reappeared, taking the one person that I loved deeply, Rain, with it and used her as its core. It took over the whole Neo Japan colony in space and threatened Earth. I, along with the other Shuffle Alliance members rushed in and destroyed the Devil Gundam and I saved Rain....."

The Gundam pauses to rub his eyes in almost a somber way. "I don't really remember anything after that. Then I woke up here, joined with the good natives of the land and fought to live."

Just then, Great Mazinger arrived onto the Floating Island and entered the training area. Quickly landing, he approaches the pair with a worried tone in his voice.

"Dammit...thought I would see Solranous here...." Great Mazinger mutters, looking at the Evangelion that was seated by Domon and then back to the Gundam, "Mazinkaiser and Galeon are going to fight Thrudgelmir soon. VERY soon. And it isn't going to be pretty either. It'll be to the death this time..."

Burning Gundam stands up in shock at the news. "No....this...this is too soon!" he shouts, "They hasn't even learned Final Fusion and they're still going to fight?!"

"I know.....I was wondering the same thing...." Great Mazinger sighs.

Suddenly, the thunderous echo of Galeon's voice enters the heads of Great Mazinger and Burning Gundam. Belay that. We have bigger problems., the lion snarls, Something BIG just arrived in the Abandoned Area. We gotta go stop it before it destroys everything.

"Roger that Boss..." Great Mazinger says back aloud. Igniting his jets and started to hover in the air. "Intros will be made later. Right now, we got monsters to smash!" with that, the machine flew off towards the location of the new monster.

Burning Gundam turns towards Shinji, a troubled look on his face. "Training is going to be held off. We're going to head to this monster. If you want to fight, you may....but be careful if you fight this thing...." Holding out his hand to the Evangelion to help him up, Burning Gundam replaces his disdain with a certain sense of courage in his eye.

[Azure_Ghidorah]

"I have to fight it, Domon..." Shinji replied, taking his hand and standing up. "It's an Angel... I can just feel it... Its just like home... this one's the first that is actively attacking humanity... just like before."

The amethyst Eva scowled, remembering that battle.

"I have to be there if you'll have any hope of even wounding that thing, conventional weapons are useless as long as it has its A.T. Field up... and I doubt you'll be able to get behind it and strike it while its open like you can me... they're faster then that..." He explained.

"Besides... it was Evangelion's job to destroy them back home... who better for the job then those of us who fought these things before? Like it or not, I'm gonna have to fight. But now I've got a reason to fight, a reason worth pursuing... Friends like you are hard to come by, after all..."

Shinji smiled under his helmet.

"Now lets go win this fight."

[Fredrex00]

Nodding his head, the Burning Gundam then lifts the Evangelion up to his feet. Igniting his thrusters, the Gundam begins to hover in the air, then grabs the Evangelion from under the arms and lifts him into the air.

"Just don't fall on the way there!" Domon chuckles as he and his pupil fly off towards the beast that threatened their home.

((End of thead unless we continue training in this thread))