Disclaimer: I do not own the characters featured in this story or the anime series they come from.
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Strain
"The assassin's cold blade carries sorrow that cuts through all happiness…"
Fenrir
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Chapter One:
RecoilThe young man pulled out a stand out of his bag and set the rifle on top of it. Quickly realizing his mistake, the boy took the gun off the stand and equipped the 6x scope on it
The boy took a quick glance at his watch and checked to see if he had his night vision goggles just in case. Not taking a second, the young man pressed the butt of the rifle against his chest, while his finger brushed against the trigger.
For this brief moment, he thought about why he was here. Why he was now killing people for an organization that once planned to destroy the world, an organization his father was now the head of.
According to them, Shinji Ikari is deceased. He died from the injuries sustained while attempting to prevent what is thought to be the Third Impact, and was buried in the same graveyard as his mother.
His focus shifted back to the present as he looked through the scope to see his target… a man entering an apartment with his family.
From many years of training, the assassin had learned that almost nothing was as it seemed. The boy turned on the thermal vision in order to see inside the taxi, and found out that it was someone other than the driver remaining in the car.
Shinji quickly found out that something was… wrong. Using the high-powered scope it was easy to see the outline of a gun in the 'son's' pants, but he still couldn't determine if the man outside the car was actually a body double.
As the 'family', whom Shinji believed to be bodyguards, walked inside the apartment complex, the man stood alongside the taxi still speaking to the driver.
"My objective is only to kill that man, but I don't know who is who." The boy whispered to himself as the driver took the money from the man leaving Shinji with less time to think before he pulled off.
Shinji had the man outside the car in the crosshairs, "I mean, the bodyguards went inside so they are probably waiting on him, but the person in the car will probably go in the back-"
The sound of the engine coming to life interrupted the boy's thoughts. With no time to spare and with a heavy heart, the boy decided he had no option…but to kill them both.
Looking though the scope in thermal vision, Shinji pulled the trigger and the round sped towards its intended victim, tearing past the top of the taxi and blowing straight through the man's head, spattering blood and brains against the seat, the windows, and much of the inside of the car.
Shinji sighed as the man was alerted not by the sound of the silenced rifle, but the newly created mosaic of death, featuring the man who had been moments before sitting alive inside the car, and ran inside the apartment as the taxi driver drove off as fast as he could.
The boy targeted the man and pulled the trigger for the second time today as he once again embraced the brief pain from the recoil. It didn't take him long to find that he missed.
This is not what Shinji wanted at all.
Some, if not most assassins enjoyed this type of task. One of the targets escaping and allowing them to play a little game of cat and mouse, but…
Shinji wanted the job to be quick without any mistakes. He wanted it to be finished as quickly as possible. Anything other than that meant more killing, and it was even worse when the target knew that it was coming.
Under the cover of night, the boy took the sniper rifle and placed the parts of the sniper rifle into his bag, "I guess I have more time to think things out."
Carefully zipping up the bag and picking it up by the scrap, he began his descent down the side of the building to carry out the 'rest' of the assassination.
As he went further down the ladder, it felt like he was falling deeper into hell with every death bringing him closer to his own fate.
Not long after the boy set foot on the ground, one of the 'family' members, the daughter to be exact, appeared in front of him, "Who do you work for?" she asked in awaiting his response as she pointed a handgun in his direction… a pretty big handgun Shinji noted.
"P-please don't make me do this," he pleaded with the girl as he also pointed his gun at her, "Run away, just say I had too much firepower or something…"
"Wrong answer."
She pulled the trigger.
Shinji blinked as he realized she had the safety on.
Recovering from the shock faster than the girl at the opposite side of this gun, Shinji took this moment to fire a shot and watched as the bullet entered and exited her forehead.
Shinji paused as the girl, that couldn't be much older than him, fell to the ground, "I'm sorry," he started to run towards the apartment complex being careful not to be caught off guard, "even if you would have run when I told you to, I would have had to kill you anyway."
He opened the door and ran through it… and narrowly avoided being shot directly in the chest by boy that was supposedly the 'son'.
Not having the time to return fire he dived behind the service counter.
"I know you killed her," the boy said as he walked across the room, "She was a good fuck you know. Now that she's gone I'm going to have to find another…" He stopped as a black ball rolled towards him.
The boy had to shied his eyes from the blinding light that filled the room, but right after it died down the body count rose by one.
Shinji took this as his chance to use the computer to find the man before the 'wife' came down. He released the breath he didn't know he was holding when he found the information he needed.
For once, he thanked God that it was not a good hotel or he would be killing a lot more people than he was now…
"Ok… I have to go up the stairs he will be on the third floor. After I do it, I'll jump out the window, pick up my stuff, and leave."
Not soon after he got up the steps he reached room 318…
He knocked on the door and quickly pressed his back against the wall beside the door. They answered the door with seven bullets…
Shinji waited for a moment then kicked down the door, only to find a gun on his temple.
"My my… Mr. Assassin, I think I may have caught you." Said the 'mother' as directed Shinji to drop the gun.
Not far from the door, a man laughed as Shinji put the gun on the ground and kicked it passed the woman…
"Now young man, can you please tell me the reason for this? Or do I have to let her do… 'something' to you?"
Shinji chose his words carefully, "I…I work for no one. I have chosen to do this and I am willing to die for what I choose to do…" he said nervously and that much amused the man in the chair.
"I'm sorry." Shinji brought his right hand up causing the string connected to his index finger to pull the trigger shooting the woman in the foot; taking this brief period of confusion to his advantage he pushed the woman down and used her own gun to shoot her…
The arrogant man now sat in this chair horrified at the event that took place in front of him, "T-that is the r-reason you was nervous!" the man shouted but was too scared to move…
Shinji stepped towards him…
~*~*~*~
The sound of an alarm clock filled the boy's ears as he instantly sat up in the bed wiping the sleep out of eyes, "…Another one of those weird dreams. I might have to ask Ms. Akagi about them or something." The young man climbed out of bed still waiting for his eyes to adjust to the sunlight filtering through the blinds so he could read the time of the alarm clock that woke him up.
He quickly took a look around the room just to see if everything was still familiar, and it was… the dark blue walls of his room matched well with the oak floors and the ceiling fan was still on as it always was.
"8:32." He said aloud as he fell back onto the bed, "I'm going to be late for…"
He paused as he tried to recall what it was he actually did…
"Work…" he whispered completing his statement.
He brushed it off as drowsiness, and got up to take his shower…
As he walked towards the bathroom, he was glad that a college drop-out like himself was able to find a job… and he was even all the more lucky to get an apartment like this.
He quickly disrobed and allowed the warm water to hit his body, in a city like this it was hard to find a well paying job, even harder if you didn't complete school.
"Ah, I forgot," Shinji reached out of the shower for a towel to dry his hand with. After he was sure his hand was dry the boy was real careful not to knock the radio off of its stand and turned it on. When the sound of a man addressing a woman about something filled his ears he withdrew his hand and continued to take his long shower as he listened to this news.
~And I saw it coming over the air like one of them, um… UFOs~
Shinji sighed as he turned the showerhead off and grabbed a towel off of the rack, "I don't see where they get this stuff from."
~In other news, the leader of the reformation party was found dead in his hotel room. The police say that it is a suicide, but because of certain information the police department have yet to release, the case is being handled as a homicide~
The boy continued to listen as he looked into the mirror to fix his tie, but as he examined his himself in the mirror he once again noticed that he had a few hairs on his chin, "I'm twenty-one years old… and still don't have any facial-"
The cell phone in his pocket started to ring as he adjusted the glasses he had to wear to correct his vision. Annoyed, the boy quickly picked up the phone to stop it from ringing, "Hello?"
"Get out." Came the quiet, frank reply.
"What?" the boy asked again completely puzzled.
"Get out of the apartment. Now."
Shinji walked out of bathroom looking for his briefcase as he still held the cellular phone to his ear, "I don't…" he trailed off as the caller hung up.
"That was strange…" Shinji took a look at his watch and decided he didn't have the time to be thinking about such things. The young man finally found his briefcase on the floor next to front door and started to walk out until… until he noticed the door was unlocked.
"You are pretty sharp," someone called out from behind him, "did you know how long it took me to find you?"
Shinji turned to find a male about the same size as he, but… it was easy to see that he was in pain, and he characterized it by the constant twitch of his eye and grit of his teeth if his left shoulder moved even an inch.
Shinji took a closer look at the boy, "I don't know what you are taking about. I-I've never seen you before in my life."
The man tapped the gun on the table as he started to think keeping his eyes on Shinji all the while, "Are you telling me that you don't know who I am?" he asked with a bit of a grin.
Before Shinji could even open his mouth the man continued to talk "I guess I'm just one of the those faceless motherfucking lackeys you always kill eh? Do you know how fuckin' long it took me to follow-No, forget that shit. Do you know how it feels to be stepped over?" The man asked in all honestly as he awaited Shinji's answer.
"Um… bad."
The sound of a fired shot echoed throughout the apartment…
His glasses fell to the floor…
Shinji stepped backwards as the bullet stopped right in front of his chest, followed almost immediately afterwards by a hexagon shaped pattern before him as the bullet dropped the ground…
"What are you!?"
"He is coming with me." Replied a calm voice from the doorway, drawing both the attention of Shinji and his would be killer.
Although she was partly hidden in the shadows, some of the sunlight that filtered through the door made it easier to make out her features. The short, blue hair that covered her ears neatly stopped at her shoulder, and the bland blue of her hair and pale white of her skin made her crimson eyes stand out the most… and those eyes held no emotion at all Shinji noted.
His perception of the quiet beauty in front of him was shattered as she lifted a gun modified with a silencer into the air and fired three rounds into the man, ending his pitiful existence.
"Ikari," she said in the same formal voice as before, "are you injured?"
The young man simply nodded his head, the terror of having a dead man in his apartment still hanging in his mind…
"I… I-I mean… Who are you?" he asked trying his best not to sound scared.
"You have no reason to fear me." She calmly walked towards him stepping over the dead man to get closer to Shinji, "Somehow I knew that you wouldn't remember. My name is Rei Ayanami."
"What d-do you mean that I w-wouldn't remember?"
"It is best if we save the questions for when we have the time to talk, it is not safe here anymore." As she ended her statement she grabbed the boy, who was too confused to resist… and he probably wouldn't have even if he had the chance.
Well at least he knew he wasn't going to work today…
~*~*~*~
"Y-you live at a church…"
The both of them stood in front of a cathedral. Although he never really went to church, he could remember from… class that it was built using the gothic design that was popular at the time.
"Yes, I live here," She paused looking upward at the sky as the storm clouds soared overhead, "I am a nun."
If their… meeting would have been a whole lot more light hearted he may have laughed at that fact, "B-but you just killed a man!"
"To save your life." She stated as she secretly led the young man in as small droplets of rain began to fall.
Despite the situation, Shinji blushed as she unlocked the door to her room and walked into it, "Ms. Ayanami… y-you aren't suppose t-to bring a m-man in here…"
"Ikari," she said once again using the same tone of voice, but with a faint blush on her cheeks, "we are not here to have sex."
The very word caused the young man's face to turn beet red, he coughed a few times to clear his throat before speaking, "Do you think you can answer my questions now?"
He took this time to actually look around the room as he awaited her reply. The room was, to put it simply, plain… it just looked like it was just void of life. He knew that nuns lead strict lives but he had no idea…
"I will tell you when I will be able to answer your questions, they are on their way here now."
He watched as Ayanami walked over to the corner on the left side of her bed and knocked on the walls till she heard a hollow tone coming from one of the spaces in the wall.
Carefully pushing the hollow part, the wood covering broke into two pieces and the woman pulled out a green duffle bag. Not wasting any time she unzipped the bag, allowing the weapons inside to be revealed to the male behind her…
With military precision, she lifted one of the assault rifles and placed a fresh magazine into it and did the same with the other rifles. She then laid the side-by-side on the floor beside the bag, and begun to check the handguns.
Shinji, not wanting to interfere with her examination, sat on the edge of the bed watching her… somehow feeling that he knew the caliber of the guns… the feel of them… the rounds they carried…
The feel of his index finger pulling the trigger as the recoil caused his hand fly upwards for a fraction of a second until he quickly lowed it to make another shot…
He came to his senses only to find that he was staring at the girl… and she was returning his gaze…
She was so familiar… it was hearing a name but not being able to put a face to go along with it…
"Shinji…" She paused as if she stopped herself from saying something else, "We have to go." Rei said as she began to stand up with a high-powered, fully automatic weapon in her hands.
"Look out that window," she said pointing towards the window opposite Shinji, "At least one of them will be standing looking directly at the window."
And he did as he was told, he pulled back the curtain and instantly noticed it was still raining… but he could still see a man outside looking at the window even though rain was pouring down at an alarming rate, "Ayanami, I… see him."
"Ikari, are you willing to take a life so you yourself can continue living?"
The boy turned to her not expecting the question, "I guess…"
"If you start now, you cannot stop. You will have to keep going no matter the outcome," She paused as the both of them could hear the heavy footsteps approaching the door to her room, "There is no such thing as a second chance in this lifestyle."
She slide two handguns towards him, "If you lift them, you will have to walk the same path as I, but if choose otherwise I cannot guarantee your safety."
Nervously, he lifted one of the guns… he couldn't possibly use two at the same time his aim would be terrible…
But he had to live… he had to find out why all this was happening… and more importantly…
Shinji snuck a glace at his female companion who was positioned beside the door waiting for them to kick it down.
He wanted to find out why she was involved…
Fin
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Ah, my first real Shinji/Rei story… o.o
Too bad it doesn't have much to do with the show yet… -_-'
Well, I don't have much to say… o.o
Next chapter: For You I Kill…