If they'd asked me a few years ago, I'd have jumped at the chance. Now . . . now I'm wondering how they can even bear to ask anyone. The agent assigned to ask me had likely long since lost his conscious.

I couldn't blame him. Not when the alternative was more self hate then even Shinji had ever been able to do.

. . . Shinji . . .

"Will you do it?"

As I push my glasses up, my thoughts reel from the question.

It had been such a nice day before now. Winter break was just rapping up and soon I'd have been able to go back to school and see my friends. Or what was left of them.

It's sort of funny how it didn't snow anymore. The cold temperatures might have broken my resolve to do this. It might have reminded me of what happened the last time it snowed. The day that my life changed.

But as bad as life had been since that day, I still couldn't say no. Not to NERV, which had struggled steadily on. Not to NERV, who in my youth I'd so longed to join. Not to NERV, who were the only ones who knew the fate of Shinji Ikari, one of my best friends.

It was scary. Everything was different nowadays. Once I'd have done anything to join NERV. But after the accident three years ago . . . now I'm just scared.

"Mr. Aida. Will you do it?"

Oh. That's right. They'd be wanting an answer sometime soon.

I sigh and decide I might as well stop delaying the inevitable. I can hear myself say yes without fully knowing why.

Maybe it's the remnants of my childhood self jumping at the chance to pilot an Eva. Maybe it's my mind wanting to know what goes on down in the geofront. Maybe it's me wanting to know what happened to the other pilots, my meager assortment of friends. Maybe . . . maybe it doesn't matter anymore. Not after that day.

"Come along with us then."

What, already? I'd expected at least some sort of a reprieve.

"Yes. They'll want to start your testing right away."

I sigh and begin to walk out, ushering the agents as I go. Once outside, I pause and turn to lock the door.

"No need to worry. As of now Section-2 will be keeping an eye on your house."

Turning to look at the agent, I give him a dubious look. I'd never been impressed by Section-2's competence. But now isn't the time to discuss this with them.

Pocketing my set of keys, I begin following the MIB's into the depths of NERV. Into the depths of answers . . . and into the depths of insanity.

A nearly empty locker room greets me as I enter. Back in 2015, before the incident, I'd have expected this locker room to be filled by now. I'd have thought that the Marduk Institute would have had more success in three years.

The reversal in birth trends and the staggering number of deaths might have something to do with it. There aren't many kids born these days, not after Second Impact. Some say its parents not wanting to bring their kids into a world as cold as this one. I can see where they come from. I don't think I'll have kids.

A lot of potential pilots probably say no these days too. After the incident in 2016 not as many people would jump into an Eva. I find this option likely as well, as I know it almost happened to me. Rooting through the luggage of my mind, I still can't quite find out why I agreed to pilot.

But of all the options to enter my head, the most fleeting, and the most horrifying, is that all the other pilots have ended up like Shinji. I fear that the song and the insanity have claimed all of them.

I sit down on one of the benches and look at my plug suit. Blue and white, just like Shinji's used to be. I allow a small smile to creep across my face as I remember back to the time me and Touji had been inside of Unit 01 with Shinji, back when he was fighting the second angel.

The smile disappears as I realize this was probably one of Shinji's spares. Maybe even the same one he wore when Unit 01 ravaged shelter #9.

My eyes were wide open when Unit 01 brought its fist down on Shelter #9. I saw it all first hand, not thirty feet away from the rampaging behemoth. Standing right outside the front door, I saw the blood that coated the monstrosity. Angel, Eva, and human. I saw the light in its eye as it brought the crushing blow down.

A light that spoke of pleasure. A pleasure alike to nothing I had ever seen before.

Its former words and actions spoke for themselves, but in a way that I still cannot quite wrap my head around. Had that been Shinji talking, or the Eva itself? What had it meant? Was I dreaming?

I know now that I hadn't been dreaming, just having a horrible nightmare in the shape of reality.

The smell hit me while I was standing there. It was noxious, far worse than my imagination had ever allowed for. I'd fancied myself ready to be a soldier, ready to deal with death and blood and violence.

Now I found out just how excruciatingly wrong I was.

As I turned my head, from following the disappearing from of Unit 01 to the carnage it had left in its wake, my mouth fell open. I realized now that the smell was one of destroyed bodies, their entrails thrown all about. Something that looked astonishingly like a kidney lay at my feet. I willed my eyes away from it.

But eventually, they just stopped listening to my pleas. My eyes glanced down.

It wasn't a kidney. It was the remains of . . . a lot of things. And for some reason, it was decomposing at an accelerated rate. As I watched, a horde of flies sprang from the blob of former humanity.

Some dim, instinctive part of me decided to close my mouth. It was almost too late, my mouth closing just barely before the flies would've entered it.

At this point I entered shock, turning away from all the blood and ruined remains of human life. I turned and began to walk away from the battlefield turned graveyard.

Was their ever any difference? I can still only wonder.

I could only shiver and cease seeing or generally feeling. My body began to wander, my mind having been forced from its throne of control.

That was the day my innocence was drowned.

It was easy to see why. Total casualties had been in the thousands. More then any other attack, enough that NERV couldn't cover them up. Commander Ikari didn't even try.

Sometimes I wake in the middle of the night, my sheets and body coated in sweat, having just finished another nightmare concerning the decomposing flesh. Sometimes I wonder how that could have really happened. A part of me knows it can't happen. That's the scientist.

'But it did happen. I saw it.'

That's the insane part of me. Other people might call it the realist, but to me it's insane.

'It can't have happened. Flesh doesn't dissolve that fast. The blob must have been something besides human flesh. Something left to decompose for days before the battle. It was just chance that I saw it. Just chance that it exploded with flies as I watched it.'

Rationalization often seems able to tackle anything.

'Delude yourself all you like,' says the insane piece of me, 'I still saw it.'

My thoughts are interrupted by a tired voice, belonging to one of the few people I know too have remained at NERV for a long time.

"Hurry up in there."

Ritsuko Akagi, head of Project E, has not been treated well by time.

With a start, I realize that I've been in the locker room for nearly half-an hour, Ritsuko's tired voice coming in from the loud speaker.

I hustle out of the locker room without wondering how I managed to get my plug suite on without paying any attention, without even realizing it.

It's cold inside the beast. This isn't surprising to me. For some reason I've always known it would have a cold heart. A cold heart like it must have had in order to kill so many people.

Unit 01 has not changed with time.

Dr. Ritsuko Akagi has.

Her hair is uncombed and a sickly combination of brunette and blonde, a result of not having enough time to continue dying it properly. She looks like she hasn't showered in days, maybe longer. It's truly disgusting. Her voice is now tired and heavy, betraying she has aged before her true time.

But she's the only person here I know, the only person here paying any attention to me.

"Close off your other thoughts Kensuke. Open yourself to the Eva. Let the Eva's mind merge with yours."

Yeah, right. Let this beast into my mind. And, while I'm at it, why not let it eat me as well?

But still, some part of me heeds what she says. I close my eyes and try to clear my mind.

But, as I remember Shinji once saying, the deepest memories will enter your mind when it's the blankest. When you're lying in bed. When you're in the bathtub. When you're synching with a monster that has countless oceans of blood on its hands.

I open my eyes. "How was he able to speak?"

It's one of the more confusing parts of the whole thing. At least, it is to me. Shinji managed to speak so that I could hear him clearly . . . oh, so clearly . . . from inside of the Evangelion. That's theoretically impossible.

"How was who able to speak?"

"You know who I'm talking about."

She really does, I'm sure of it. Who else would I ask that about?

Nevertheless, she looks at me like I'm crazy.

"Shinji."

There, I said it. The forbidden name of the boy who-

"His vocal cords," she says. I can feel a bit of sarcasm in her tone. I can see a pinch of amusement playing across her face. But why would those be there?

"Evas have vocal cords?" I'm surprised by this, to say the least. Especially since the voice sounded exactly like Shinji's. And I could've sworn Unit 01 roared as Shinji raved.

Ritsuko blinked, apparently surprised by my latest question.

She must be losing her touch with time.

"How was Shinji able to talk through his Eva during the battle three years ago?"

Now she understands me.

"We don't know."

Very helpful. But I suppose I should have expected it.

"That's right. I'd forgotten you were there when it all happened."

I nod calmly, my image transmitted from the entry plug to the command room. Speaking of when I saw Unit 01 go berserk is not one of my favorite topics. Then again, it probably isn't one of Dr. Akagi's either.

"Close your eyes and try to concentrate harder. Your scores are absolutely horrible."

I sigh, expelling the last few bubbles from my lungs. I do as she says, closing my eyes and trying to concentrate.

But once more, I find concentration only brings forth the memories of a long finished, or so I hope, battle.

The corpse of the eighteenth angel wasn't even cold yet. The huge spider, something my mind continued to claim should've collapsed under its own weight, lay vanquished. And then Unit 01 had frozen, balanced above its kill as everyone else began to go about repair and retrieval tasks.

The other Evangelion units had already been returned to the geofront, or were on their way. In a twist of fate they'd left the brooding beast alone with the city, thinking it as their savior. Just like the rest of the cities citizens had.

Then, somehow, Shinji could be heard throughout the city. Hell, there have even been newspaper articles of people claiming to be able to hear him on the other side of the planet. They could even recite what he said, although they all claim it was in their own native languages.

Which is stupid since Shinji only knew Japanese.

"I-"

Only a single syllable, but repair teams had stopped their work. People leaving their shelters, like me, had stopped in the doorways and turned towards their protector, the source of the sound.

"I . . . What is this?"

Slowly, everyone who could see Evangelion Unit 01, everyone near my shelter, shelter #9, turned to look at it. No one had ever seen or heard an Eva speak before. Most people weren't even sure if it was possible. Questions on the tip of their tongues, confusion in their minds, they turned to look at Unit 01 and Shinji.

"This song. Misato, who's playing that awful music over the radio?"

Silence reigned over the square. Unit 01 brought its right arm up to its head, attempting to massage its skull. It wasn't a drastic move, brief and un-threatening, but people nearby all took a step back. If they'd known what it was about to do, they'd have taken a lot more.

We couldn't hear the response from the command center. Maybe they said something wrong; maybe that's what drove him over the edge.

I'd always thought it was Asuka saying something insulting that drove him over the edge, but I'd never had the balls to say it to her face. Not the way she was after the incident.

But no matter why, Unit 01 decided to roar then. A raging hell storm of a roar, from the gut of a beast forty stories tall. I still think it should've deafened all of us there.

But it didn't. Or, at least it didn't deafen me. I never had a chance to ask anyone else gathered there. It all happened too fast.

It was strange, but over Unit 01's roar I could hear a quieter voice, Shinji's voice. And behind it I thought I could hear a hint of music too. Just a brush of a piano, the haze of an orchestra. There seemed to be no tune to it, a great discord that pulled at my mind.

Some part of me has always thought I missed out greatly, not hearing the song that Shinji could hear. Another part of me, neither the scientist nor the insane part, still thinks it's what drove him mad.

"It- It's all pointless. . . I can see it now. This little world doesn't even matter to them."

We all watched, horribly transfixed to wherever we stood. Shinji's voice began to take on a more menacing voice as he continued, something that seemed unnatural to it.

The distant music grew closer now. It was like listening to gibbering monkeys trying to play a symphony. Everything about the music seemed wrong.

"We don't even warrant their hate! They couldn't care less if we lived or died. We're just ants to them."

Then Unit 01 stopped its roaring and the plaza grew quiet. Everyone stared at the gargantus in shock and with a bit of horror. The tension could've been raked by Unit 01's claws. To me, everything in existence seemed to hang on whatever Shinji would say next.

"So let the blood-dimmed tide be loosed upon this world. Like so many others before it."

The words have never left my mind. No matter how hard I try, no matter how long it's been. No matter how far I go.

Seconds after Shinji finished speaking Unit 01 smashed the first building, sending repair workers plummeting to their death and debris hurdling towards civilians. Then he'd turned his eyes on the masses gathered around him.

I stood paralyzed in shock as he killed those who ran. A few did manage to make it into the shelter.

It didn't help them when he put his fist through it.

Chapter 1 is over.

It's been awhile since I've posted (or written) anything. I've been reading and reviewing quite a bit lately, so I suppose its only natural that my creative itch would choose this time to scratch itself.

There will be three chapters in this fic. The other chapters should be out from anytime between a week and a month. Although, it might be sooner.

As my readers may know from my ramblings, I'm always on the lookout for ways to improve as a writer. After reading Children of an Elder God for the third time, it struck me that I might try some sort of horror. And wa la (sp?) this was born.

As always, feel free to leave a review.