Disclaimer: Naturally, I don't own nor have any rights to Neon Genesis Evangelion or any of the characters, because I am not Gainax. I am not using these characters with the permission of Gainax or anyone involved. I am not using this for profit, just entertainment, so please be kind and don't sue me.

Author's Notes: Contains spoilers for episodes 23 - End of Eva. Reviews would be very much appreciated, thanks! Rated R for [future] violence, language.

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The familiar noise of construction and creaking buildings rang the alarm earlier than usual that morning, but the girl whose apartment the noise assaulted was already awake. She lay silently in her bed, staring up at the cracked plaster ceiling blankly, her crimson eyes empty. She tried hard to remember things that had happened to her before today, but she could not. Even the recent days before were lost to her, and she couldn't remember anything clearly before the haziness of yesterday. 'I had not lived before yesterday.' The words meant nothing to her, elicited no emotion. She was the third. There had been two before her, and it meant nothing to her. All of the people she had seen since then, the Commander, his son, Dr. Akagi...She had known them, but they were only vaguely familiar to her now.

The Commander...'I require you to see me tomorrow morning, Rei.' The Commander's words had seemed somehow...suspicious to her. She suspected that they had been said many times before, for they resonated with a strange familiarity within her. But she was certain she had never had these words spoken to her.

"Commander Ikari." She said the words aloud, testing their familiarity in her mouth. "Who are you?"

Slowly she swung her legs off the bed and stood up, and made her way to the small mirror hanging on her browning wall. She stared at the reflection of a being she couldn't really be sure was herself. She turned away, noticing the objects strewn upon her dresser. There lay a pair of glasses she was sure belonged to him. She lifted them to her face and examined them closely, as though they would give her an indication of his relationship to her. 'What do you want from me?' Frowning slowly down at the cracked glasses she held, she heard suddenly eerily satisfying crack of broken glass and plastic. Looking again, she realised that the Commander's glasses now lay twisted and destroyed in her hands. She stared, stunned, when a splash on the shattered glass startled her. She blinked a few times quickly, to notice that tears were sliding down her cheeks. "Is this a tear?" She sounded surprised, bewildered. "I'm seeing this for the first time, but it feels familiar. Am I crying?" Rei frowned, confused, at the tears across the Commander's broken glasses. "Why am I crying?" She felt angry, that this should make her cry, that something was upsetting her that she couldn't remember, something that would compel her to crush the glasses she held. 'What do you want from me, Commander?'

*

Rei Ayanami stood in front of Gendo Ikari's desk, staring at him expectantly as he watched her from behind dark glasses, his hands folded to hide his mouth. "You were expecting me, Commander."

"You know of your purpose, of course, Rei? Why I need you so."

"I have been briefed," she replied flatly. Gendo nodded, stood up, and walked around his desk to stand close to her, raising his hand to rest upon her cheek. "You're perfect," he said fondly, stroking her soft blue hair from her face. "And I have given you life." Rei said nothing, observing him, and he stepped closer and his mouth twitched in what she supposed was a smile. "I have created you, Rei. You owe me, your creator, your life. You...owe me everything."

Rei hesitated. "Yes, sir," she said finally, turning her face away. Her first instinct had been to so reply, obediently, but she had hesitated when she realised she didn't know why she felt compelled to obey him.

"You were always so loyal, so obedient," he continued, his hand, still gloved, dropping to her shoulder. Her eyes flashed in the direction of the door behind him, but she remained unmoving, as though bolted to the floor by the hand on her shoulder. "You have always been so perfect. You have never disappointed me before. So naturally I expect nothing less than complete loyalty from you." She frowned, nearly imperceptibly, but Gendo caught it, and lifted her face to force her to look into his eyes, which were burning with an emotion she didn't recognise, but which frightened her. "You owe me everything, Rei. I have given you everything. You owe me your life."

His hand on her chin was strong and she held in a whimper of pain. She found herself fighting back the hot sting of tears, but she nodded shallowly. "Yes, sir." Her voice was barely a whisper. She was to obey him, then: this was her relationship with him. He was her Commander, and she, well, it was her purpose, then, to obey him. But as he firmly and insistently pushed her to her knees before him, she allowed the tears to slip from her blood-red eyes and pour down her cheeks, hidden to him. She closed her eyes so that she wouldn't have to see.

*

Rei stood shaking in the shower of her broken apartment. She had run as fast as she could away from him after leaving his office, but still she felt she would never be far enough. She scrubbed at her body until her skin was red and sore, desperate to cleanse herself. She could still feel his hands on her body, still feel him inside her, and she felt unclean, and ashamed. Tears poured down her cheeks and mixed with the warm water cascading down her body, and she cried, holding herself tightly. Blood dripped down the insides of her thighs, but she tried her best to ignore it, to ignore the pain inside her. 'I owe the Commander everything,' she repeated to herself, chanting it over and over. 'I owe the Commander my life. I am to obey the Commander.'

"I owe the Commander everything." But even aloud the words were hard to swallow, and felt empty and regurgitated. She squeezed her eyes shut tight as she tried to convince herself of his words, tried to justify him to herself. "I...I belong to the Commander." But no matter how hard she thought, she could not reconcile herself to what her Commander had done to her. She stared down at the blood on her thighs, and frowned. He had made her bleed. She would not accept any Commander who hurt her for reasons she didn't know. He had used her like a doll, as though she existed for his pleasure alone. But somewhere in her heart she knew she did not. 'I may look like her; I may have the same name, even the same soul. But I am not her.' "I am not her!"

Rei had vague memories of her. She had loved the Commander, she knew. It had taken years of conditioning, but she had accepted what he had done with her, because his was the only touch he had ever known. He had taken care of her; he had created her. She believed him: she felt she did owe him everything. "But I am not her," Rei repeated, louder, more daring. "He will not use me like he used her!"

Deliberately she turned the shower off and stepped out into her apartment. Tomorrow she was to return to NERV to see him again. She would go, but she would not forget. He would soon learn that she was not her.