The Fragile Heart
Shinji Ikari wandered the streets of Tokyo, CD player clutched in his dead-white fingers. Ode to Joy drowned the humans brushing past him; women in their business suits and dark-eyed children staring through him. He saw none of them; only the wide grin, silver-white hair and laughing eyes of Kaworu. He clenched his fingers against the delicate shells of his ears as if they bled, screamed, slumped his head into the cool roughness of a brick building. No one paused to drop a hand on his shoulder or offer a comforting word.
Comfort—he gave me comfort. Douishite? Why Kaworu? Tears dripped the length of his face and dampened the rough brick resting against his cheek. Other faces intruded on his thoughts; his father's cold, forbidding eyes, dark and warped in a frozen visage—Misato, all snap and verve, and still distant. They all had their shells. Asuka's anger. Rei's quiet. Each of them traveled their orbit and left him to his cold place. Only Kaworu reached out, found him special, loved him.
"You fear the initial contact of these Lilims because you understand, and they don't." Shinji's eyes popped open, lips trembling like leaves, to see Kaworu's slender, tall form bent over his own. The people passed down the streets like vague shadows, smears of paint, all curves to Kaworu's angular face and warm red eyes. They soothed and frightened Shinji, as though he floated in a sea of blood.
"Ka-Kaworu kun!" Shinji buried his face in his friend's chest. Warmth and light radiated into his own slender form; not dead, a tangible person to touch and feel. His choking laugh drew tears to spell fresh across the dried ones. "How can you be here with me? Everything ended when I killed you. Why can't I see anyone?"
Kaworu stroked his thumb down Shinji's cheek, a burning sensation lifting the tears from his skin into the air. They hung above them like ethereal jewels, as real and perfect as Shinji's radiance. "Death is my true freedom. You gave me the human gift of love, because no one else gave it to you. The light of my soul survives and soon, you will see the shadows like I see them. They are all afraid."
"I'm afraid—Kaworu kun! Don't leave me here again." He grasped the other's iridescent body, fingers slipping and trying to keep the nothing he could hold. "KAWORU!" He sobbed, slapped both hands against the other boy's shoulders. "I don't know what is happening to me. You were the only light and I wanted you to stay with me. Why did you die—why did you?"
Make me kill you..
The horror bloomed in his mind, Kaworu clutched within the claw of Shinji's Eva unit, wide smile rising to his lips and sweet, gentle words belying his death. The horrible sound of his head popping from his body and splashing to the depths of the water. The destruction of the only person to assuage his loneliness. In one day Shinji felt alive and loved, in the same night lesser than before, more shadow than the shadows passing the corners of his eyes. The world looked a smudged canvas but for the radiance of Kaworu.
His friend rustled his slender fingers through Shinji's dark hair, his voice a warm, inhuman comfort. "You don't see, Shinji Ikari. Pain fills delicate heart like yours and leaves it empty for my joy. You aren't like anyone." He nuzzled against Shinji's cheek and drew his name in Kanji. It stayed, smeared in shadow-paint by their faces. "I came to love you and to die at your hand was joy."
"Iie!" Shiji shoved Kaworu back and covered his mouth in horror. "Not joy, Kaworu—I wanted you to stay with me. I'm not seeing you now. I'm dreaming, oh horrible dream. I loved you too. You aren't here—I loved you."
"Shinji Ikari—"
"No! Don't say more, please. I can't stay here with you in this place, because I'll have to go back and remember your face. I hate you, Kaworu kun." He choked and sobbed the words while clenching his fists, fingernails breaking the skin and drawing blood, sharp, crimson liquid contrasting the shadows. "If you come back and lay in bed with me, listen to my music with me and tell me these things—if you can be real for me, then talk to me. What is this place? I'm dreaming.. I'm dreaming.."
"I hate you!" Shinji drew back his hand and slapped the pale-faced boy, the sharp sound echoing, rippling the air like a tossed stone effects water. Kaworu's smile brightened despite the red welt blooming at his cheek. "Stop smiling—say you hate me too. Say you hate me for killing you." He covered his face with his arms, expecting blows, body trembling. His heightened perception in this place guaranteed horrible pain when Kaworu struck in revenge.
The grey-haired boy stood still a moment—jerked forward, captured Shinji's arms and slammed him against the shadow-swirling icy wall. His joy-bright red eyes and smile never faded as he pinned his friend hard against the brick. "Shinji Ikari, I don't understand hate. You Lillims have God's gift of guilt in your soul, but I don't want to punish you." He pressed his lips against Shinji's and drowned the other in the pure, sweet sensation—Kaworu's love overshadowing the other's pain.
The silver-haired boy stroked his fingers along Shinji's jaw as his lips pressed in gentle, innocent love to the other's. Innocent, Shinji thought, Innocent even though he tried to destroy us all. No true malice lay within his friend's spirit. I'm the bad one. The weak one. I should have let him live..
"If I struck you, would your guilt turn to joy?" Kaworu drew from the kiss to ponder, eyes sad and distant, smile lingering with the kiss's moisture on the Angel's slender face. "I wanted my life to end instead of yours. You should go on because you desire life, and I experienced what I wanted of it."
"Kaworu kun.. Don't hurt me, Kaworu—" Shinji stared in openmouthed horror at the upraised hand alongside his friend's sad smile. The other's form, unreal, dead as he knew Kaworu to be, seemed the only real thing here. The sharp outlines of his body and face constituted the Earth. He covered his face with his hands again. Kaworu caught them, held them to the swirling, painful blurred cold of the brick wall. Shinji sobbed; thin body tensing every muscle, eyes darting sideways to avoid the Angel's, and returning to his the next moment. The shifty human shadows dripped fear into the center of his being, moreso than Kaworu's possible strike. Kaworu reeled his hand back and leaned forward to kiss his friend's trembling forehead.
"Hurting you will make you well, Shinji Ikari—"
"Boy!" A rough open palm connected with Shinji's cheek and started his eyes open. A crowd of people had gathered in a circle, like carrion crows, around his sprawled body. He placed his hand to his cheek and stared, teary eyed, at the pudgy, cold male towering above him.
"He's fine," the man grunted. "Drink some water, kid." He thrust a paper cup of tepid liquid at him and backed away. The others followed. Shinji brought the cup to his lips and spilled it with shaking hands. Kaworu.. Did you hurt me, Kaworu? It really was a dream.
He murmured. "I love you," to the spilled water, got up, dusted himself off. He found the tape player on the ground and rested the headphones against his ears. Ode to Joy. He held his face as he stumbled to the bus terminal. Ode to Joy. He smiled, tears staining his cheeks. The pain drained out of his glass heart.