This is an AU Evangelion story taking place right after Shinji is called to Tokyo-3 and battles the Third Angel in the first episode. The only character who truly will be different is Shinji. Please Enjoy and Review.

The automated door to the lab opened, and the Third Child walked in and took a seat. The look in his eye could not be accurately described as boredom. It seemed as if he was going through the motions, performing some kind of obligation. How would she approach this? The Third Child was his son, after all. Just begin, and move along from there.

The Third Child looked up and focused as a tall woman in a lab coat approache him from her chair and held out her hand. "I'm Ritsuko Akagi, head of Life Sciences and Stratgic Defense Initatives here at NERV."

He looked at her for a moment. He had the same penetrating stare his father had, the one that made you feel somehow naked and ashamed of yourself. But those glasses his father wore seemed to diminish that effect, make it somewhat manageable. The Third Chile...Shinji, did not. For several seconds, he continued to examine her. Finally he stood up and took her hand with surprising strength.

"Shinji Ikari." he said, a slight rasp in his voice. Why was that? She suddenly remembered his profile. She had spent the last week before the Third Child was supposed to arrive studying his data. He had been home schooled in Osaka by his aunt and uncle for most of his life. He probably spoke to them the most, and was not used to talking to others outside his immediate family. But he didn't seem shy, which was often happened with home schooled children. Looking into his eyes, there was this...intensity in them. Similar to his father, but somehow different.

"This way, please." she motioned towards a nearby door that led to her office. Shinji followed her, and took a seat in a chair near the window. He looked outside at the Geofront, saying nothing. Ritsuko opened a cabinet near her desk and pulled out a computerized device, and a wireless biomonitor. She placed the device, a medical bioscanner, on a nearby table and activated it. It hummed with power, and began a test cycle of it's diagnostic and monitoring programs.

Shinji turned around as Ritsuko tapped him on the shoulder. She handed him the biomonitor. "Would you mind putting this on? I will be interviewing you, and I will need to monitor your reactions to certain stimuli."

"You a shrink?" he asked. "I'm not mad or anything, I just want to know."

"Yes. I'm a certified therapist. My other duties take precedent, but I am responsible for interviewing propective EVA pilots when they arise."

"Prospective EVA pilots?" Shinji asked, a trace of amusement in his voice. "It seemed like I was your only pilot yesterday, when I fought...what was it those techs called it? The Third Angel."

A slight trace of anger crossed Ritsuko's mind. He seems as arrogant as his father...

Shinji shifted down and looked into her eyes. "I know what you're thinking, Doctor." That snapped her back to reality. "You're thinking I'm as arrogant as my father, I am quick to dismiss and use people, like he is." The utter look of surprise betrayed her for a moment. "It wasn't so hard to figure out. Although he is a stranger to me, I feel as if I know my father by the reactions he seems to inspire in others."

"But let's move on, Doctor Akagi." he continued. Shinji removed his jacket and rolled up one of his shirt sleeves, revealing quite a muscular arm for a 14 year old. He attached the biomonitor and turned it on, a low hum coming off of it.

The boy was quick. At least that was something to be grateful for. And he knew who his father was, even if he seemed too quick in his judgements of the man.

Dr. Akagi took a seat across from Shinji and detached two small microphones from the bioscanner unit. She handed one to Shinji, and he attached it to his shirt collar, and she did the same. She tapped it to get a sound reading an began.

"This is Doctor Ritsuko Akagi, Head of NERV Life Sciences and Strategic Defense Initatives. This is a prospective EVA pilot interview for Shinji Ikari, codenamed the Third Child. Age 14. The date is May 2, 2015, at 1525 hours. Recording is active."

"Now what?" Shinji asked. "You have a list of questions?"

"No lists." Ritsuko said. "We just talk, and see where the conversation takes us, alright?"

"Where do we start, then?" a tone of irritation, cleverly hidden, was in his voice.

"Let's talk about yesterday."

Shinji raised an eyebrow momentarily. "Yesterday. May 1st was a strange day." he said, a slight look of reminiscence on his face.

"Why strange?"

"What other way can I describe it? I'm called to this city by a father I barely remember, who tells me that I could be the last hope for humanity. When I refuse to help him, he gets ready for send a girl who looks like she's about to fall apart in my place. I would consider that strange."

"Why did you initially refuse to help him?"

There was a lost look in the Third Child's eyes for a moment. "I don't know, exactly. Instinct? But then it came to me that to just turn him down out of hand, because of the past...it would have been petty and vindictive."

Petty? Vindictive? Ritsuko's mind stopped for a moment, collecting this. She never would have imagined that anyone named Ikari would admit to being petty and vindictive. She had assumed that it just wasn't in their genetic makeup.

"You said your father getting ready to send someone else in your place also moved you to action. Did you pity her?" Somehow, those words felt like poison to her. Again, Rei and her safety was behind the reason an Ikari did anything. It was beyond maddening. One could say that it was insulting.

"No...it was not pity. You know what responsibility is? I only realized that seeing that girl get wheeled out and prepared to fight. Responsibility is sometimes doing things you hate, or are intolerable to you, but that are necessary. It would have been wrong for my father to hurt her because I wanted to hurt him by saying no."

Was the son truly different from the father? His answers confused her, but they seemed genuine. That sounded new to her. The Commander rarely was genuine about anything.

"You want to hurt your father?"

Something in Shinji seemed to...switch at that question. His eyes, which had been clear and focused on her for the past forty minutes, became unfocused and distracted. He began cracking his knickles in a rapid, nervous fashion. A beeping sound was coming from the biomonitor. From its insistent chime, Ritsuko could tell that Shinji's heartrate had jumped at least twice. His synapses were firing at rapid speed. He physically looked as if he was struggling to keep his composure. Finally the beeping stopped, and Shinji seemed to even out.

Who knew that getting the Third Child to actually react to something would have been so simple? Ritsuko was actually surprised that his reaction was so strong, so noticable. What kind of man was the Commander, to produce such a reaction in a son that was essentially a stranger to him?

"I'm sorry about that," he said conversationally. "Thinking about my father...old feelings always come up to the surface, even if I don't want them to."

"Does that happen often?"

Shinji's head snapped back up and looked at her. This time, his look was not one of disinterested analysis, but of anger. She could see a raging fire behind his eyes, something not in control. It did not seem to be directly aimed at her. Was someone like this really suited to pilot? So...mercurial? One moment cool, collected, and the next a raging monster, ready to strike out?

"Have you...have you ever felt so negatively, hated so much, that the hatred, the venom you felt began to turn against you? become poison in your veins? For the longest time, after my father sent me to live with his brother and his wife in Osaka, I felt that way towards him. He wrote me off, made me a nonperson, but I was still alive... I still had to function, feeling that way about myself. It was horrible, and it caused problems."

"What kind of problems?"

"I got into fights with people at school over bullshit, really. I was becoming really good in martial arts at the time, and I put a couple people in the hospital. I was fighting with my aunt and uncle over little things. I was just feeling really blue most of the time."

"What changed?"

"One day I got into an argument with them over something. I don't remember what. In the heat of the moment, I said to my uncle that he should'nt have children, because he was like his brother, and would leave them. I don't know why I said that."

"What did he do?"

"What did he do? He beat the living shit out of me. I was eight, and he beat the shit out of me. Broke my arm. I think at the time, I was really hurting, and what he did didn't really matter."

Didn't really matter? Ritsuko was floored that he seemed so blase about what happened.

"I spent a week in bed, and a few weeks with my arm in a sling. Soon after, they both left their jobs and devoted their time to raising me. At first I was confused. How could they still want me around after what I said and what happened? I eventually understod that when you're swirling around the drain, like I was, the people who care enough about you will save you, even if it hurts."

Shinji cracked his neck and got up out of the chair. He had been talking for over two hours. He removed the biomonitor and placed it on Ritsuko's desk.

"I'm done for now. I can't talk any more. Can we continue this another time?" he said, fatigue in his voice.

Ritsuko stood up. "We're actually done. I have everything I need."

"Whatever. I agreed to stay with Captain Katsuragi. You have any idea how she is to live with?"

"I think that is something you should find out for yourself." Ritsuko said. She put out her hand. Shinji shook it, and left.

After the door closed, Ritsuko locked it. She then walked to a bookshelf in the corner of her office and pulled out a micro-samera from a secure spot. It had recorded the entire session. It would be very useful uin compiling her report for the Commander. How had the son be so different from his father? She made a notation to run background searches on Shinji Ikari's aunt and uncle living in Osaka. Whatever influence they may have had would need to be determined as to how it would affect the Third Child coming back into contact with his father again.


The Commander reviewed the report on the Third Child. He closed the folder. "Your report in this case is unusually short and concise, Doctor."

"Shinji Ikari, in my determination, is mentally fit to be an EVA pilot. Whatever... earlier instabilities may have been present in his life previously do not factor into his present psychological condition. The boy is focused, and stronger perhaps than we know. He can be quite an asset to the organization."

"Let us hope that the boy is strong enough to follow orders, doctor. Or blood relation or not, he will be replaced. You mentioned in your report that I factor significantly into his present psychological makeup. I sense an accusation somewhare, Doctor." His voice was incredibly even and businesslike.

"What I mean sir," Ritsuko said, trying to reclaim the situation before it fell against her. "For good or for ill, Shinji Ikari's present state, his experiences, who he is, much of that stems from you. during the interview, I noticed a severe reaction when you came up. Eventually, that will have to be dealt with and resolved, or he may turn against us, you, in particular."

Gendo Ikari turned his chair away from her, and now looked out the window. This was a signal he was finished with her. "Your observations are noted, Doctor. Good day."

After the Doctor left, a side door in the Commander's office opened, and a middle-aged man in a dark uniform walked out and sat before the Commander.

"Your opinions, Fuyutsuki?"

The old man chuckled. "Earlier instabilities... The good Doctor Akagi has a way with words. In regards to your son, it is too early to tell. It is a pity you decided not to raise him. There is something in him...it will not break. Not even for you. Perhaps especially not for you. I viewed the recording Akagi made of her session with the Third Child. You seem to be largely the root of his anger. Akagi wrote that he supresses that anger often, and as such, one day it may grow into something out of control."

"If that day ever comes, I will deal with my son, and initiate the conclusion of all we have worked towards. Perhaps he will then understand why he was sacrificed, and what future I was working towards."

"Perhaps."