The Hallway
Chapter One
From Maths to Second Impact
Neon Genesis Evangelion is owned by GAINAX
Misato Katsuragi looked Tokyo-2 lights from her apartment and the intensity of neon lights was her therapy for distracting mind after a long journey in NERV. Shinji Ikari was sleeping in his room, and Asuka watched TV in the living room with Pen Pen. The penguin felt sleepy and left Asuka alone in the room, but Misato came back to the table where Asuka was watching and reading some things about mathematics. The captain tried to understand why the girl was struggling with the exercises.
"Maths is complicated". Misato took an exercise book and Asuka just commented about derivatives and integrals. "You don't need it".
"I don't think so, because there is a life beyond NERV". Asuka felt scared when Misato reacted some amazed to her words, but the woman just smiled.
"You attended college in Germany, what is the challenge here in Japan?" Misato watched the unsolved exercises in the book. Asuka didn't say anything because she felt embarrassed.
"I-I have some troubles with the language". Asuka admitted it and her captain put a serious face.
"We spent almost seventeen years from Kanji number one to the last character according to the Government. Nobody knows the whole characters in few months or years". Misato reminded when Second Impact delayed Government programs for Education because the priorities turned to reconstruction. "Maybe, people is writing and speaking worse than past decades".
"What about you?" Asuka asked Misato for the missing years after Second Impact because she heard some things from Kaji about Misato and the Second Impact.
"The yellow wings blinded us, but the effect was greater for me. Adam woke up because my father wanted to do something with his team. I was with him". Misato looked around if Pen Pen had left some beer cans, but the penguin drunk the remaining cans.
"Were you shocked?"
"Maybe, but the experience was different. Okay pilot, it is late, please go to bed". Misato felt how Asuka realized the unexpected end of the talking, but she preferred to obey Misato and some minutes later Katsuragi was alone in the living room. Then, she looked to the hallway and the closed doors of Shinji`s and Asuka`s rooms. Misato compared her home with the closed space where she spent two long years completely quiet after Second Impact, and the curious eyes that watched her from the windows.