Hello, all. This is my first major attempt at a fanfic of any sort, so I hope you enjoy it. Note that, while this is nominally a crossover between Neon Genesis Evangelion and Shin Megami Tensei, the distribution is somewhat one-sided; while this story will feature demons and themes from across the Mega Ten franchise, the bulk of the story is Evangelion, and thus, beyond certain recurring entities, no characters from the Megami Tensei games will appear.
Also note that I am going by a mixture of the show itself and Rebuild of Evangelion for this particular story's continuity; as such, expect a few curve balls to be thrown your way. I sincerely hope you enjoy the tale, but be warned; as this is a fusion of Evangelion and Mega Ten, this story could get quite dark by the end.
Disclaimer: I am fully aware of how redundant it is to claim that I don't own the characters, concepts and sundry thingamabobs and plot elements of Evangelion and Shin Megami Tensei on a website like this one, yet I'm doing it any way. Why? It amuses me.
And now, without further ado, my good readers, it's showtime.
It had all started so well, the boy thought.
He rose to his feet, a slight groan escaping his mouth at the motion; perhaps he should not have been sitting cross-legged on the asphalt for so long. His scrawny, sweat-covered frame was naked from the waist up, his shirt having been discarded long ago as it offered him little protection from the pervasive and all-encompassing humidity characteristic of this land; now it's only use was to serve as a rank cloth to wipe perspiration from his brow.
He moved to the entrance of his domicile, his stride stilted and awkward from the cast covering much of his fractured right leg, and glanced outside. All he could see beyond his door were green trees, fronds, and her and there a faint ray of sunlight that had managed to pierce the canopy.
So far, so good…
The boy brushed aside the leafy curtain that served as both the concealer and door of his domicile and stepped out, his bare feet tingling slightly at the touch of moist grass, slick moss and sundry other things one could be expected to find in such a verdant place as this. The humid air filled his nostrils with countless scents utterly alien to his experiences, and he glanced about warily as he moved, eyes roaming the shadows for any sign of whatever it was that had attacked him.
His right hand drifted unconsciously to his belt, grasping at thin air; this act brought a weary sigh to his lips, one that was quickly repressed. Given the circumstances, he could not afford to be overly careless. Perhaps today, he would be lucky; perhaps today he would actually find the stupid thing.
And perhaps you'll slip up when you least expect it and wind up dead, his mind replied in the most cynical, self-flagellant manner possible.
The boy was forced to nod in acknowledgement of the accuracy of this statement, cruel though it may be. Even so, if he had any say in the matter he would find it today. His left hand drifted down to his belt, closing tightly around the long, hard shaft with which he had become intimately familiar over the past few days. Its rough texture and comfortable weight felt reassuring in his grasp, and its heft was perfect for performing deep, powerful thrusts. Thank goodness he had found the stick and had been able to fashion it into a proper spear so quickly, or he would never have survived this long.
A faint rustling caught his attention, and the boy whirled to the left, drawing his spear and raising it in one fluid motion as his eyes scanned the foliage for the sound's source. Even though the forest was perpetually gloomy here at ground level and his vision suffered as a result, he quickly caught sight of a number of trembling ferns, their leafy fronds shuddering violently and loudly; whatever was in there was in all probability quite large and carnivorous.
In spite of this knowledge he stood his ground, waiting patiently and warily as the creature drew closer; in this place, to turn one's back on a predator was to invite a swift and painful death, as he had discovered through first-hand experience. The four parallel gashes which ran across his back ached in sympathy, their presence mute testament to the brutal laws which held sway over this lush and verdant hell; he would not flee the danger again, no matter how great it might be.
I mustn't run away, he thought to himself, the words giving him strength and purpose. I mustn't run away, I mustn't run away, I mustn't run away…
He continued to repeat this mantra, mouthing the words as whatever lurked beyond the ferns drew ever closer, his breath accelerating to match the frenzied beating of his heart, adrenaline flooding his system, perceptions seeming to slow down until everything moved at veritable crawl; mustn't run away, mustn't run away, mustn't run away, fight or flight, fight or flight, fight or flight, fight or fight, fight, fight, don't flee, fight!
Something large, brown and hairy lunged at him from the foliage. The boy did not even have time to think, diving forward to drive his spear into his assailant with a primal scream. A faint squeal accompanied the sudden spurt of warm, viscous blood which spurted from the creature's wound, and the creature went limp as he lunged beneath to evade its counterattack.
No such retribution came; instead, the beast went limp and collapsed onto his back, driving the air from his lungs and his body head first into the damp soil. The boy barely had time to close his eyes before face met moss, and soon he found himself struggling to breathe while his nose and mouth were submerged in three inches of fetid water.
Muffled screams came from him as he flailed about, instinctively trying to surface in spite of the fact that he could not swim, and that most of his body was relatively dry; seconds later his brain made the connection and ordered his hands to plant themselves in the muck and push down. His head rose slowly from the water, coughing up fluid and sediment and God knows what else might have been floating around in there as he attempted to clear out his lungs and draw breath—not an easy task to accomplish when one is pinned to the ground beneath a hairy, foul-smelling carcass that weighs nearly as much as oneself.
The boy managed in any case, somehow rolling the beast off his back as he turned himself right-side up and slowly got to his feet, careful not to place too much weight on his injured leg. Once this was accomplished he bent down with a weary sigh and, thankful that the spear had not been crushed beneath the animal's bulk, pulled his weapon free of the creature with a wet, meaty tear. He shuddered faintly at the sight of his assailant's entrails, glad that this time he had managed to keep from voiding the contents of his stomach in response to the blood and gore; the last thing he needed was to undertake this search while covered in vomit.
He glanced at the carcass of his assailant, shaking his head in bemusement; despite having encountered this sort of beast all too frequently over the last few days, the boy had never quite gotten used to their bizarre appearance. The animal—if indeed it was an animal, though the boy suspected otherwise—was rotund and shaggy, the vast majority of its spherical body covered in a thick brown coat that was decidedly at odds with the hot, humid environs of this rain forest. Two hairless and strangely humanoid legs jutted from the creature's base, their pachydermatous feet ending in a half-dozen long, sharp dewclaws, and in place of a head there was only the long, sinuous grey tube of an elephant's trunk. How it could see, or indeed, whether it needed to see at all, was a mystery that the boy had found himself pondering on numerous occasions in recent days.
The boy shrugged, turning to walk in the direction from which his assailant had come; after several minutes of ducking beneath or pushing aside numerous fronds and low-hanging branches, he began to hear faint bass tones in the distance. He paused, cocking his head to one side in order to better receive the sounds.
Is that music?
He moved forward a few paces, allowing him to pick up a few higher notes that had been obscured by the lower sounds, and nodded. It was definitely music—techno, from the sound of it.
Not bothering to consider the incongruity of techno music playing in a jungle, the boy began to move towards the sound at a much faster pace; every step made the song a little louder, the melody a little clearer, until soon it was almost as if the music's origin was right in front of him. He began to run as fast as his injured leg would allow, hopping through the dense foliage at a respectable speed, until with one final hop, he suddenly found himself outside the rain forest and standing barefoot on asphalt.
The boy came to an abrupt stop, puzzled by this sudden turn of events, and looked around. Behind him the forest seemed to stretch on for miles, its leafy dominion stretching from one end of the horizon to the other, yet it abruptly terminated in in a perfectly straight line less than two feet from his current position; before him, to his complete and utter shock, was a veritable labyrinth of towering skyscrapers and smaller buildings, all of them standing at odd angles and inclines that would have sent any proper city planner into a screaming fit at the sheer instability of the architecture. Many of the towering, crooked edifices bore signs, banners and advertisements in a language the boy could not understand, and most of the street level establishments had a decidedly disreputable air about them; many appeared to be taverns, pubs and strip clubs. All the buildings were covered in a vast network of pipes and ducts seemed to grow across their surfaces like creepers and belched smoke and steam from various valves at completely random intervals, and apart from a few overturned—and long-abandoned, if the dust was any indication—cars and buses, the streets were completely empty. In the sky, barely visible behind a barrier of smog and bloated clouds, the moon hung like a limpid and bloodshot eye, the red streak which ran across it fully visible as it waxed to fullness from a half-moon before the boy's very eyes.
A faint gleam of cream and crimson moonlight reflecting off something metallic caught the boy's attention, and he looked down to examine the light's source. To his surprise, he found that it was a small, handheld cassette player—an SDAT, to be precise, and one which the boy was reasonably certain belonged to him. He reached down to pick it up, pulling some headphones from his pocket and began to listen; sure enough, the faint tones of Chopin and Bach, only slightly degraded with age and use, identified the player as his own.
That's one small comfort, at least, the boy thought as he hooked the player into his belt. He rose to a standing position, cradling his spear in one hand, and looked upon the maddening sprawl before him in utter confusion. Now that he reflected on it, the architecture looked very familiar—but that was impossible. The city—everything—had been destroyed, hadn't they?
"How the hell did I get into this mess?" Shinji Ikari wondered aloud.
NEON GENESIS EVANGELION: NOCTURNE
Episode One: Reset
Sometime earlier…
The boy lay curled up in a foetal ball, naked in a sea of thought and personality. Concepts and identities which did not understand and had no desire to comprehend assailed him from all sides, clawing at him, tearing into his very soul, each trying to force him to choose one way or another, to convince him that their beliefs and theirs alone were correct and thus the best for both himself and humanity.
I mustn't run away, I mustn't run away, I mustn't run away…damn it, I can't do it! Why was this responsibility forced upon me?
A familiar voice called to him, the very sound of it giving its speaker a form, conjured from nothing in this place of memory.
"What's wrong, Shinji?" asked Kaworu Nagisa. "Are you finding it difficult to come to a decision?"
Shinji brought his hand over his head and clenched his eyes shut.
"I don't want to decide…I can't! Why was this thrust upon me?"
The white-haired, red-eyed boy knelt down and placed a comforting hand on Shinji's shoulder. "I sympathize, my friend, but unfortunately you must choose. Third Impact has already begun, and once started it cannot be stopped; it falls to you, and you alone, to decide the fate of your kind."
The Third Child pulled away from Kaworu's touch, shuddering in revulsion. "I just want things to go back to the way they were before, damn it!"
The Angel's friendly expression disappeared. "They cannot, Shinji. While the future remains mutable, your past has been set in stone; you have no time left. A decision must be reached, and it must be now."
"Then give me more time!" Shinji cried out.
Kaworu drew back as if struck. "You would dare," he began, his usual friendly demeanour faltering as he tried to utter the words without spitting them out in anger. "You would suggest that we change the rules so late in the game? I never took you for the audacious type, Shinji Ikari."
You speak as if such is beyond our abilities, Tabris.
The two boys turn slowly in the direction of this new, frighteningly deep and authoritative voice. A swirling vortex of white light hung in midair a short distance to the Third Child's left, and it drifted closer as they watched; its radiance was so intense that Shinji was forced to avert his gaze in order to keep from going blind.
Kaworu rose and stood protectively before the other boy, staring down the light in determination. "What business do you have here? This realm is beyond your jurisdiction."
A dry laugh, like the sound of glaciers slamming into one another, emanated from the vortex; Shinji had to fight down the urge to either flee from the light or throw himself upon it in a futile display of violence.
Have you forgotten my position already, Tabris? I am the Face and the Interpreter; nothing is beyond my jurisdiction. Now leave us; Master Ikari and I have matters to discuss.
Kaworu cast an apprehensive glance in Shinji's direction, and then nodded; immediately afterward his body and clothing dissolved into a pile of orange fluid, and soon he was utterly indistinguishable from the rest of the protoplasmic soup in which the Third Child lay.
The light drifted closer, coming to a halt before Shinji's face.
On your knees, Ikari; it is not becoming to speak to one's betters while lying down.
The boy complied, not wanting to test the unnatural light or the unpleasant voice emanating from it. He stared at the sea of LCL before him to give his eyes a reprieve from that intense radiance.
"W-what is it you want?" He stammered.
I want nothing, Third Child. You wish for more time, do you not?
"Yes…"
The sound of snapping fingers cut through the air like a knife, and the boy found himself ducking reflexively.
It is done. You shall have adequate time to ponder what choice you shall make, even though you will not remember this conversation. Be forewarned, however; in asking for more time, you have made things a great deal more complex than they were before. You have chosen the longer, harder road, Shinji; I hope you are ready for it.
Before the Third Child could ask what the light meant, it was gone—and Shinji was suddenly aware of a loud, roiling noise that echoed from somewhere behind him. The boy turned and beheld a small whorl in the sea of LCL, at present no bigger than a pinprick yet rapidly widening before his astonished eyes.
Shinji tried to swim away, bless his heart, but it was no use; the whirlpool was growing far too rapidly and his feeble attempts at dogpaddling only resulted in his imbibing of a large quantity of the omnipresent orange liquid, flooding his tongue with the iron taste of blood. Then the great vortex sucked him down, and he was drowning, drowning, even though some part of his mind recalled that, if LCL was oxygenated, drowning within it should not have been possible. Coppery fluid flooded his lungs as he desperately flailed his arms in what he hoped was a reasonable facsimile of the breaststroke, but to no avail; the current's pull was far too strong for even the most accomplished of swimmers to prevail against, and down he went, the sea darkening with every passing moment as he drew further and further away from the surface.
High-pitched giggling reached his ears, drawing his attention from the surface to his immediate surroundings. His head whipped about wildly, and he quickly discovered that he was not alone; the sea was filled with countless hundreds, if not thousands, of identical pale-skinned and completely naked girls of his own age. They all stared at Shinji with the same vacuous smile, their blue hair cast blonde through the orange tint of the LCL and their red eyes gleaming faintly in the rapidly diminishing light, and Shinji could do little more than stare at them in horror as the vortex continued to drag him down, down, down until it was pitch-black, and only the glow of their crimson orbs could still be seen.
I must be dreaming, the Third Child thought—in the shadows, the eyes of the numerous Reis seemed to take on a panoply of different forms and colours, and their laughter began to deepen, become course and rough until it wasn't laughter at all; then even the eyes disappeared, and Shinji finally gave in, loosing one final breath as the LCL flooded his lungs and everything went black…
Another time, another place…
Chairs, handholds, the gentle pitter-patter of wheels running on tracks…was this a train?
It certainly seemed that way, but if that was the case, where was everyone? The crepuscular light flooding through the windows dictated that most people would have left the workplace and been homeward bound by now, yet the car was completely empty. Stranger still, there did not appear to be anyone in the cars to the fore or back of this one.
Shinji Ikari did not bother to ponder how he knew this, seated as he was; his attention was focused on the more pressing matter of how he had gotten on this train in the first place. He had no ticket, as far as he could tell, and he did not recall boarding the train or even going to the station. In fact, had he glanced out the window, he would swear that he had never seen the countryside through which it now passed in his life.
So why and how was he here?
"So, have you picked out a name?"
The boy whirled, eyes wide in confusion and alarm, looking for the source of that sudden and oddly-familiar voice. "Who's there?" he called out, sounding braver than he actually felt.
Another voice spoke then, seemingly in response to the first; this one sounded oddly like his father. "If it's a boy, we'll name him Shinji, and if it's a girl, Rei."
"Shinji…Rei…" the unseen woman echoed the names, unable to keep the delight from her voice; a warm chuckle filled the air, and Shinji, for reasons he could not fathom, felt content.
The laughter cut away suddenly, to be replaced by a flat, inflectionless tone that sounded vaguely like a younger version of the first speaker, and Shinji felt his hackles rise as his happiness fled.
"Shinji…Shinji…Shinji, Ayanami…Rei…Rei…Rei, Ikari…"
The dusky light suddenly vanished, plunging the car into darkness; Shinji let out a brief gasp, trying to rise from his seat but unable to do so, his legs frozen and refusing to obey him.
"No—Rei, Ayanami."
Something pale, naked and altogether unpleasant surged out of the black, lunging for him with a vacuous expression, and…
With a gasp, Shinji awoke.
The boy sat up, staring in confusion at sterile white walls and the soft morning light which flooded this room; the sole sound to be heard was the faint cry of cicadas, droning away nearby if their volume was any indication.
After a moment he lay down again, taking in the room's Spartan features with no small amount of anxiety: a wheeled tray sat to the right of his bed, carrying a large thermos and a glass of drinking water; the wall to his left was comprised entirely of ceiling-length window panes whose glassy surfaces revealed only the glare of the sun; the door sat beneath a faint green sign and lacked any form of handle or lock, probably automatic; and the tiled ceiling was marred only by a single square light that seemed to stare down at him in mild accusation, as if demanding to know what he was doing in this room, in those clothes and in this bed.
"I don't recognize this ceiling," he realized.
So began Shinji's first day in the cranial trauma ward of Nerv's onsite hospital. He would spend the next few hours alone, aside from a brief encounter with the girl Ayanami in the hallway, unable to recall the rather bizarre contents of his dream save for a vague sensation of unease, and occasionally staring at his arm in introspection, his mind wandering back to the hell of battle and the terror and pain he had felt as he faced the Third Angel in combat. The pain had felt so real when that...thing…had broken the Eva's left arm, and every now and then he felt the flash of phantom pain as his right eye struggled to focus on whatever he might happen to be looking upon at the time.
"What the heck am I piloting?" he would muse.
It was during one such period that Misato found him, sitting alone in the waiting room as the demands and queries of the hospital staff sundered the contemplative silence. The lieutenant-colonel had come to inform Shinji that, as the doctors had deemed him both physically and mentally sound, he was to be discharged and given a residence. Twenty minutes later, after his effects had been returned to him and they had an encounter—one might say a standoff—with his father, Shinji discovered that fate had thrown him another curveball…and while the attractive, purple-haired woman had been nothing if not kind to him during their brief acquaintance, he felt that living with her would be too much of an imposition and so politely declined her offer to become her roommate.
Of course, Misato wasn't having any of that, and soon he found himself standing in one of the geofront's many identical hallways, listening as she chatted animatedly with Doctor Akagi over the phone to confirm the arrangement. Realizing that resistance was futile in this matter, he remained silent, going through a bag containing his effects as the lieutenant-colonel drove them to the streets above in her beat-up Alpine A310.
"So, what do you say?" she asked, bringing him back to the more immediate world. "You ready to live it up tonight?"
"U-uh, I dunno," he stammered.
Misato's cheerful smile told him that he wasn't about to avoid this by staying on the fence. "Come on, at least let me throw a welcome party for my new roomie. It'll be fun!"
And so the pair quickly found themselves at Lawson Station, a convenience store possessed of a decidedly unsavoury air, in order to stock up on the various goods and snacks a welcome party demands. Unfortunately, this also involved listening to a pair of gossiping women discuss the current state of Tokyo-3 and how a great deal of its residents, for fear of their own safety, were moving to other towns and cities. Shinji could hardly blame them, given all the collateral damage Unit One must have caused during its rampage, but even so their words still hurt, and he found himself reaching for the earphones and power switch of his SDAT-player…only to discover that it wasn't in its customary place on his belt. The boy frowned in confusion and pulled out the bag containing his belongings, his confusion giving way to anxiety as his rummaging through the sack's contents failed to produce the music player. Where was it?
"Looking for this?" Misato asked, her expression sympathetic as she retrieved a battered and beat-up device from her pocket.
Shinji's face fell at the sight of his beloved SDAT—broken, the casing cracked, the tape within in pieces and the player itself snapped in half; only a few wires and a single screw kept it from falling apart altogether.
"What happened to it?" he asked her, his tone a little sharper than he had intended.
The shadow of a frown crossed Misato's face for a moment; then it was gone, and she shook her head. "I'm sorry, Shinji. I meant to tell you sooner but you were unconscious and Nerv has kept me pretty busy supervising the clean-up from the Third Angel's attack. I'm pretty sure it broke while you were piloting Unit One; it was like that when Ritsuko and the others pulled you out of there."
She held the broken player out to him as gently as possible, then reached into her purse and withdrew a not-inconsiderable amount of yen with a smile. "Here, I can handle this stuff. There are a couple of shops on this street that specialize in music, electronics and things like that; maybe someone can fix it for you."
Shinji stared at the money in trepidation. "Thank you, Misato—really, thank you—but I can't—"
"No ifs, ands or buts, Shinji!" his guardian declared cheerfully, shoving the money into his hands. "This one's on me. It's the least I can do for you, all things considered. Now go on, I have things under control over here; meet me back here in fifteen minutes, okay?"
"I—"
"Okay!"
And with that, he was shoved unceremoniously out the door.
I guess Misato really isn't the type of person who'll take no for an answer, the Third Child mused as he pocketed the cash. He turned and began to walk down the street, looking for any stores that might match the (admittedly barebones) description the lieutenant-colonel had provided him. It took him a few minutes, but eventually he found one—and it took him no time at all to notice the large "Out of Business" sign hanging in the main window. Confused, Shinji glanced across the street and quickly found another AV store…and quickly discovered that it, too, was closed. He began to run down the street, his anxiety mounting as every shop related to electronics, music, and audio-visual equipment revealed itself to be either closed, for sale or out of business. What sort of madness was this?
Finally he came upon one such store that was still open, although not for much longer if the proprietor hanging an "Out of Business" sign over the front door was any indication.
"What's going on?" Shinji asked as he struggled to catch his breath. "I was told there were shops where I could get my SDAT-player fixed on this street. Why has everyone closed down?"
The store's owner—a grey-haired, balding man with a pointed nose and a thick moustache—turned and offered the boy an apologetic shrug.
"Sorry, kid, we's all gettin' out while the getting's good. There ain't no market for music in this city, an' runnin' a store in a town that gets trashed regularly by giant monsters can only be bad fer my business and my life expectancy."
"But I need a way to fix my SDAT-player, or buy a replacement!" said Shinji, holding up the cassette player in question.
The proprietor took one glance at the ruined device and shook his head. "Even if I was willin' to stop an' help ya, kid, I don't stock dat model. Sorry, pal, looks like yer outta luck."
And with that, the man went back to nailing his sign to the door.
Shinji sighed and turned around, his gaze downcast and expression sullen. What was he supposed to do now? That player had been a gift from his mother, given to him shortly before her tragic death; to lose it now was to lose not merely a cherished possession, but also one of the few remaining pieces of his mother that he had left. He began to walk back to Lawson Station, wondering what he would tell Misato—would she believe that all the stores had closed indefinitely, or would she just think that he was being modest again?
Something caught his eye in the midst of his brooding, and he looked up. His gaze fell upon a small and rather tacky-looking store, with a midnight blue front and velvet curtains obscuring the doorway and the window, the former of which featured an engraving of a cello and the latter featuring a wide assortment of music boxes, phonographs, a Walkman or two, several CD players and sundry other audio-visual devices. The Third Child's gaze drifted upward, and he read the store's name aloud as if to confirm that it was real.
"'Velvet Melodies: giving form to your true self since Nineteen-ninety-two'? How did I miss this place?" he wondered.
Noting a small, handwritten sign that proudly displayed the word 'open' in an elegant script, Shinji shrugged and pushed the curtain aside to open the door. The faint tingling of bells and chimes accompanied his entry into the store, and the Third Child saw that the name was not hyperbole: everything in the shop, from the racks of tapes, compact discs, cassettes and LPs to the plush chairs that sat in small clusters around demo stands and the censers that hung from the ceiling in ornate braziers and filled the air with clouds of incense, were cast in shades of blue velvet. Soft choral music wafted from speakers set into the corners, setting Shinji at ease, and the walls were covered with glass display cases containing music books, players and music boxes from every culture and every era; curiously, they all bore a large playing card of some sort in addition to their other contents, and small plaques set underneath identified them by such unusual titles as "The Chariot," "The Hierophant", and "Death."
Eventually his attention was drawn to one case in particular; unlike the others, this one possessed only a card depicting a happy young fellow in foppish clothes, carrying a small cloth bag on a stick and clearly about to set out on a grand journey of some sort. The plaque identified it as "The Fool", and three small pedestals—one red, one blue, and one grey—were arranged in a triangle before it; Shinji found himself pondering the significance of this arrangement.
"Do you like what you see, young master?" a soft voice called from right behind him.
Shinji whirled with a start, coming face to face with a visage that not even a mother would be able to love. The man was short, barely any taller than Shinji himself, and his body was long and lanky, clad in a dapper suit that matched the store's furnishings. His head was disproportionally large for his shoulders, hic complexion was pale, his nose was prodigiously long and poked invasively at Shinji's face, and the man's eyes seemed fierce and demented.
In spite of this rather fearsome countenance, Shinji found that the man was not particularly threatening, and he even seemed merry and amused by the boy's initial reaction. The Third Child composed himself and said, "Y-yes, I do. It struck me as odd that this case, and this alone, was empty."
"An insightful observation, young master," the man replied with a nod. "The Fool remains empty because a suitable occupant has yet to be found."
"Why are they named that, anyway? Does it have something to do with these cards?"
"Indeed they do—the contents of these cases correspond to the Arcana they bear; their owners bore many of the characteristics associated with the card in question."
The boy cocked his head to one side. "I'm sorry to interrupt, but what's an Arcana?"
The man smiled warmly. "The Arcana are the twenty-two face cards found in Tarot decks, young master; in ancient times they were used for soothsaying and divination, and the results of such forecasts often had profound effects on the recipient."
He inclined his head with a knowing look. "But I get the feeling that you didn't come here for a lecture on the history of the Tarot, did you young master?"
"Oh!" said Shinji, his posture straightening unconsciously. "That's right. Do you have a repair kit for an SDAT-player like this one?"
He reached into his pocket and pulled out the device, and the man leaned forward to examine it with a critical eye.
"My, my," he breathed. "I have not seen one of these in a long time. There is a history to this one, I'm sure; given to you by a close relative, perhaps?"
Shinji nodded, inwardly embarrassed that the man had cut to the heart of the matter so quickly.
"Don't worry, young master; I know well the value such a gift holds to its recipient. In fact, I will not entrust the future of this cassette player to a simple repair kit, personal though it may be; I shall perform the task myself."
Shinji brightened. "Really?"
"Of course, young master," said the man, waving a hand as though the matter were trivial. "Leave it here with me, and I will make all the necessary repairs. This device still has quite a road left to travel, after all."
"Thank you." Shinji began to withdraw the yen from his pocket, but the man held up a hand to stop him.
"Payment isn't necessary, young master; one of my policies is that a new customer always receives his first service free of charge. It is, to use the vernacular, on the house."
"Your generosity is too kind, but I insist—"
"And I insist, young master," the man interrupted with a long finger jabbing Shinji lightly on the nose. "I insist that you take said generosity; there is far too little of it in this world. Now then, payment isn't necessary; all you have to do is sign this ledger so that I might contact you once the work is done."
Here the man produced a thin book with a red cover, and opened it to the first page. Half the signatures were already full, but the handwriting was oddly indistinct; Shinji couldn't make out a single name. A pen lay in a glossy metal sheath at the top of the book, and it seemed to Shinji that strange symbols covered its shaft in a veritable lattice of indecipherable shapes as he took it.
"Right here?" he asked, pointing at the first free line.
"That is correct, young master; phone and address aren't necessary, the name is all I require."
Shinji nodded and put the pen to paper. The music seemed strangely muted, the room slightly darker as he wrote his name in crimson ink, but the sensation passed as soon as he was done. The man took the ledger from him, nodded as he perused the page, and closed it.
"It has been a pleasure doing business with you, Master Ikari. Now, regrettably, I must ask you to leave; my craft is a rather complicated fare, and I tend to guard its secrets jealously."
"I understand," Shinji said. He glanced at his wrist, wondering how much time had passed since he had left Misato. "I need to get going now, anyway. Thank you, mister…?"
The man turned to face him, a warm smile on his lips. "There is no need for such formality, Master Ikari; you may call me Igor."
"Igor," Shinji echoed. A bit of an odd name to hear in this country, but then again they lived in a world where giant monsters of nebulous religious significance regularly try to wipe out the human race; stranger things than a Slavic name appearing in Japan had happened. "Thanks, Igor!"
And with that, the boy dashed out the door and was gone. Igor smiled, holding the SDAT-player up with a knowing smirk.
"No, Master Ikari, thank you."
Misato was standing by her car, arms crossed and tapping her foot by the time Shinji returned. Her face was a cheerful mask, betraying none of the concern and irritation that warred for dominance within as she turned to greet him.
"There you are! You had me worried for a minute; I was just about to come looking for you." She leaned forward inquisitively, hands clasped behind her back. "Did you find what you were looking for?"
"Y-yeah, I did," he murmured.
She smiled. "Good! Now let's go home."
And so they drove on their merry way, the road before them illuminated by the last rays of the setting sun. Shinji found himself carrying the grocery bags, the trunk being packed with numerous car batteries and other things which could not easily be moved. The boy's initial surge of elation at having his prized player repaired was beginning to wear off, and he found himself slipping back into melancholy.
Misato noticed this and decided to do something about it. "Hope you don't mind, but we need to make a tiny little side trip."
Shinji glanced at her. "Where are we going?"
She smiled with a faint laugh. "Somewhere nice, you'll see."
Shortly they found themselves at a lookout station set into one of the mountains which ringed Tokyo-3, gazing out at the city and the odd, cross-shaped arrangement of large octagonal panels that lay at its heart.
"From up here the city looks so lonely," Shinji observed, not understanding how this was supposed to help him. Sure, the crepuscular light washing over Tokyo-3 made for quite a sight, but it was not as if he'd never seen a sunset before.
Misato did not reply, glancing at her watch for a moment before nodding. "It's time."
Klaxons not unlike those signifying an air raid split the air, and with the groan of metal against metal and the faint growl of hydraulics, the city began to shift and change before his very eyes.
"Amazing," he breathed, unable to mask his incredulity at the sight. "The buildings…they're growing!"
Indeed they were; all across Tokyo-3 towering edifices and skyscrapers sprouted from the ground, titanic metal ears of corn reaching up to catch the last of the sun's rays as enormous bolts slammed home and wedge-shaped projections sprung out to keep them in place.
Misato noticed the boy's excitement and smiled, watching the spectacle with her arms folded across her chest. "This whole city," she explained, "is a fortress built to intercept Angels. It's our city, Tokyo-Three. Take a good look down there," she added, meeting his gaze. "You see it? That's the city you protected."
Shinji turned back to the spectacular view, so different from the cityscape of a moment ago, and had to admit that he felt the faintest swelling of what might have been pride. The gleaming towers caught and reflected the rays of the setting sun, creating a magnificent display of light and colours that played out across shining metal and shimmering windows. Perhaps living here and working for Nerv wouldn't be so bad after all…
A sudden shadow flitted across his vision, and the Third Child blinked as if to remove a hair from his eye. That was strange—for a moment, he could have sworn that it was night, and that the great spires were sagging under the weight of a vast network of pipes and roots while the mountains choked under a thick jungle. The odd spectacle was quickly gone, however, and he decided that it must have been his imagination. Even so, he had never been partial to such flights of fancy before, and the vision had put him slightly ill at ease with how vivid it had been; he could have sworn that he had felt the intense humidity of the jungle, had actually seen the pale orb of the full moon glaring down at Tokyo-3 from above, its beauty marred only by a red scar which ran down its length…
Fortunately they drove to Misato's apartment then, and all thoughts of the strange vision were pushed aside as Shinji found himself acclimatizing to the rather shocking difference between his guardian's professional attitude in the workplace and her decidedly unprofessional attitude at home. Who would have thought that a single can of beer could have wrought such a drastic change, turning her from Misato the Lieutenant-Colonel to Misato the Party Animal? Her overly-friendly behaviour was unnerving him, and the fact that she now wore only a yellow tank-top and denim shorts which hung tightly to her admirable figure made it very difficult for him not to stare; thankfully she didn't seem to mind, and even enjoyed the attention to an extent. Following a few unfortunate yet humorous incidents at his expense—seriously, why was there some sort of mutant penguin living in the refrigerator?—and a rather embarrassing moment where she got a very good view of his modest equipment, Shinji settled into a bath to muse on the day's events…though not without some prodding from Misato first.
"Wash all those worries down the drain!" she had told him, cheerfully wagging a finger in his face.
Misato Katsuragi, he thought, staring at the ceiling while he soaked in the tub. She's not a bad person, she means well…but for me, bathes only bring back a wash of bad memories.
"Dreamless town, ticking clock, I walk away, from a soundless room…"
The Third Child blinked at this sudden intrusion and looked around, trying to find the source of the unexpected voice. "Who's there?"
"Windless night, moonlight melts, my ghostly shadow, to the lukewarm moon…"
He realized that the words were accompanied by faint music…and that the voice seemed to come from his discarded pants. Was that his cellphone?
"Nightly dance…of bleeding swords…reminds me that…I still live…"
"I don't remember that ringtone," Shinji remarked, getting out of the tub and searching through his pockets. Sure enough, his cellphone was ringing and was the source of the unexpected j-pop music that now filled the bathroom; the screen helpfully informed him that whoever was phoning him was calling from an unknown number. "How helpful."
The singer had just begun to proclaim that she would burn something when Shinji flipped the phone open and accepted the call. "Hello?"
"Ah, Master Ikari!" said a familiar voice. "My apologies for calling at this unseemly hour, but I felt it best to inform you that the work is going well."
The boy frowned momentarily before remembering the speaker's name. "Igor, wasn't it? How is the SDAT, is it alright?"
"Indeed, young master. My repairs should be complete soon; you can come pick it up on the morrow."
The boy brightened immediately. "That's great! I'll be by to pick it up after school."
"Excellent, young master; I shall see you then."
The owner of Velvet Melodies hung up, and shortly afterward Shinji turned in for the night, a little happier than he might have been under different circumstances.
A strange fog rolled into the city that night, and Tokyo-3 was struck with one of the worst heat waves in recent memory. The whir and humming of air conditioners straining to remove the humidity from the atmosphere reverberated throughout town, and the fog rapidly filled the streets and alleyways until it was impossible for anyone out and about to see more than five feet ahead. Discouraged by the sudden heat and humidity, most people withdrew to the comfort of the indoors, leaving their nocturnal business for tomorrow; as such, there was no one around to witness what occurred next.
At an intersection where the fog was particularly thick, the traffic lights flickered and went out. The air seemed to ripple faintly, and a deep groan, like metal against metal or glaciers grinding together, rumbled from everywhere and nowhere at once. A tiny pinprick of iridescent light formed at the heart of these ripples, cycling through every colour known to man and many that weren't as it rapidly expanded from the size of a dime to a man-sized tear in the fabric of space and time; riotous colours, intense scents and sounds both wondrous and terrible to behold wafted from this hole, and had anyone been nearby they would have seen a vast menagerie of shapes and forms moving within the rift, the sheer wrongness of which would drive a man mad.
Fortunately this distortion did not remain open for long; less than five seconds after it appeared it rapidly shrivelled away into nothingness, and the air was still. The traffic lights came back on, dimly illuminating the intersection as the fog thinned slightly. Yes, the rift was gone…but something remained.
It was difficult to see in the dense mist, but several things were immediately apparent: first, that it was small, barely taller than a ten-year old child; that it was humanoid, although its odd proportions clearly indicated that it was not actually a member of the human race; and finally, that it was perspiring heavily.
"Oh, this heat, ho," it said in a high-pitched and childlike voice, lending credence to the idea that it was young…or at least youthful. "It's way too hee-hot for me, ho; gotta find someplace where I can chill and cool off…"
The entity flickered for a few seconds, the sound of fat droplets of water striking the pavement almost deafening; then it was gone, and the fog lifted altogether.
This is the life, Penpen thought with a nod, tapping his talons to a rhythm only he could hear as he read the paper and ate some tuna.
Well, maybe not read; for all his advanced intellect, Penpen was still a penguin, and so while he could interpret those words with which he was familiar, stringing them together into a sentence, let alone reading, was beyond him. Yet he did it anyway, because Misato didn't know any better and it amused him to unnerve the withdrawn human child by affecting the mannerisms of the working-class slob.
Even so, a bird could only pretend to read for so long before it started to grate, and he folded up the paper with a tired squawk. Perhaps the television will offer some stimulating topics of discussion, he mused, picking up the remote to turn on his prized thirty-inch plasma screen TV. After all, the environmental debates usually start at this hour.
The set came on, displaying a documentary about a rather deviant species of ape that solved all its problems with fornication, and Penpen changed the channel in disgust. That is the last time I leave the set tuned in to the Discovery Channel; there's nothing but smut and more smut on that station. And humans look on it so highly, the barbarians…
Abruptly the screen dissolved into static. The penguin frowned, cocking his head to one side and clacking his beak in displeasure. Dear me, but the aerial seems to be on the fritz. I suppose I must endeavour to fix it, then, as the comely wench and the frail boy lack the necessary technical expertise…
And with that the penguin hopped out of his chair and waddled to the door, going in search of the toolbox. He extended one talon to unlock the portal, and the door slid upward—bringing him face-to-face with something so bizarre that he could only stare at it in confusion. It appeared to be a diminutive human with a simple face consisting of two jet-black, oval-shaped eyes and a wide mouth with two small fangs. Apart from a pair of blue booties, a matching jester's frilled collar and an odd cap with two zigzagging, earlike projections, the creature was completely naked, and strangest of all, it appeared to be comprised of densely-packed snow.
"Wark?" said Penpen.
"Hee-ho?" said the snowman.
Shinji awoke to the sensation of something jabbing him in the side. He sat up with a yelp, the pain clearing away any last vestiges of sleep, and found himself looking straight into the eyes of a certain penguin.
"That hurt," he stated, rubbing his bruised side. "Do you do this to Misato too?"
"Wark!" Penpen snapped, flapping his wings in the direction of the kitchen with as much urgency as he could muster. When this did not make the boy rise, he dashed behind him and gave him a peck right in the middle of his back.
"Ow!" Shinji leapt straight up. "Okay, okay, I'm up. Jeez…"
He allowed the penguin to lead him to the kitchen, where the muffled sounds of something rummaging through the fridge could readily be heard. The Third Child briefly wondered how Misato could possibly sleep through this, then reminded himself that she was dead drunk. He turned to Penpen and whispered, "Is it a robber?"
The penguin shook his head and pushed the boy forward, giving him a squawk of encouragement before retreating to a safe distance. Annoyed and somewhat unnerved by the bird's cowardice, Shinji advanced on the fridge, pausing only to pick up a rolling pin that happened to lie atop the pile of rubbish his guardian called a counter, and thumbed the switch for the freezer door.
His eyes fell upon the snowman, which was presently sitting in Penpen's chair and reading Penpen's newspaper while nursing one of Misato's beers, and he could do little more than stare with his mouth hanging open. "W…w-what?"
The creature looked up, its black eyes widening in surprise. "Hee-ho, crap! A big one!"
"Hee-ho?" the Third Child parroted, not understanding the strange word.
"'Hee-ho?'" the little snowman repeated, sitting upright as his eyes a cartoonlike, angry expression. "You aren't a hee-ho, you liar; you're a hee-human! Don't try to hide it, I can see the ho-roller pin in your hands. You're gonna bump me off, ain'tcha?"
Shinji drew back, appalled. "No! I'm not going to kill you."
"Liar!" the little snowman hopped out of the chair and cast aside the newspaper, and the temperature in the apartment seemed to drop sharply. "I can see-hee it in your eyes, ho; you wanna bump me off an' take my demonee-ho so you can get strong, don'tcha ho?"
"I don't even understand what you're saying!"
"And now you're makin' fun of my hee-speech patterns, ho! Well, forget it, 'cause this Jack Frost is one snowball that you ain't gonna hee-melt, ho!"
And with that, the little winter spirit did a quick pirouette and landed with one palm facing Shinji; the Third Child stepped back as the temperature dropped even further, and frost crackled around the snowman's outstretched hand.
"Bufu!"
A jagged icicle, nearly a foot long, shot from Jack Frost's palm towards Shinji's heart.
By Jove! Has Shinji been slain? Unlikely; after all, if the main character dies before the story even begins that flashforward would be rendered utterly meaningless, now wouldn't it? To paraphrase a certain tale from this site, "in chapter two Shinji is not really dead. It swa (sic) a trick!"
In any case, I hope you all enjoyed this first chapter of Neon Genesis Evangelion: Nocturne. The second chapter is not long in coming, though as I am about to start university, my updating schedule may be a bit sporadic, and further chapters might not be quite as long. In the meantime, feel free to read and review; this is my first major fanfic, as I said earlier, and constructive criticism is appreciated as it can only improve my writing skills.
Until next time, my good readers.
Sullen Frog