Herald: Sorry for the delay folks! I had this chapter written up before finals week, but things went downhill super fast afterwards. And once I got back on my feet CBS went and cancelled Jericho, so I had to cuss them out until they brought it back.

Anywho...hope you enjoy, and remember I in no way own NGE...just Asuka's Emotions.

Asuka: What was that Swine!?
Shinji: Sit Girl! Asuka slams to the ground Thanks for the necklace Big Guy!
Herald: We guys have to stick together. Just...watch...nevermind shakes head
Rei: Sit Shinji! Shinji slams to the ground

Sorry, couldn't resist bringing a little crossover into the mix, lol. sigh On with the story!

"Let me go you two!" Shinji struggled against the cloth that now bound his arms around the pipe.

"And be spanked again!? You wish…" Asuka smirked as she took a long swig from a canteen. She made sure to take a very long drink in order to torture the boy prisoner.

"Then could I at least have some water?" He finally said when Asuka finished. Rei was glad she wasn't in Shinji's position, even if she could have held out better than he did.

"Sure, knock yourself out." The redhead tossed the canteen, but her injured arm asserted itself and caused her aim to be thrown way off. Instead of going into his hands, the container slammed into his head, leaving him unconscious. "Jeez…don't have to take me so literally."

Rei could only shake her head in wonder that Shinji had survived living with this demon.

"How he was able to put up with your abuse, I'll never know."

"If you think I'm bad try living with Misato's cooking and teasing about the slightest thing. I'm sure she would have had a challenge with you though. You're about as dense as lead when it comes to being human."

"And you are as dense as hydrogen."

"Damn straight." Asuka nodded and then it hit her. 'Hydrogen atoms that exist in the environment float straight up and out of the atmosphere, so…she just called me an—GRR!'

"THAT'S NOT FAIR REI!"

"All is fair in love and war."

"Bullshit! If that is so what about Shinji, hmm? Obviously we both have feelings for him, and that isn't because he's the last pervert on the planet!"

Neither one knew that the other had the same thought at this point: What do I see in him that makes this feeling bubble up? And What can I do to get him to choose me over her?

Each child was left to her own thoughts, although Shinji was again left to unconscious land, where he was content because he wasn't putting up with Asuka. Although this could be argued because he was having the same dream again.

"Please…don't leave…….love…." He murmured.

"Wake him up. I want to know what's going on with this stooge." Rei leaned over and kissed him on the forehead and untied him, then brought him to a sitting position with him in her lap. Asuka looked like she was about to blow a fuse (A/N: we aren't talking a house fuse here, were talking one of the ones that control megawatts of electricity).

"You had your time with him, now I wish to have mine." 'Besides, since I have some of his mother's DNA, I may…be more accepted by him.' She knew that if either one of her fellow pilots knew the source of the DNA for her construction, that she would probably be killed or worse, exiled.

Asuka growled at the thought of having to fight Rei of all people for Shinji's heart. 'I'm already at a disadvantage because of my arm, not to mention the pain I feel in my eye.' But she decided that at least the albino was showing some emotion for once, so she would let Rei have this moment with her Shinji.

"Good….doggy." Shinji smiled in his sleep and his hand reached up to Asuka's head and gave her a quick pat.

"SHINJI!" The slap heard round the world echoed in the theater. What Asuka didn't realize was that Rei had protected Shinji and taken the slap for him.

"Why'd you do that?" Asuka fell backward, not knowing how to react to hitting the other half of the female population.

"I don't know. I simply don't want to see him get hurt anymore. For some reason I am even accepting of the idea that it may take my life to protect him. And for the first time in my existence, I know that statement holds a meaning." A single tear roll down her face and onto Shinji's as her cheek swelled slightly. "He's the only person to treat me as more than a tool. He doesn't deserve the crap you and NERV put him through." Asuka now was treated to a sight that no one (and I mean no one) had seen before: Rei sobbing.

"Look…I…" Hikari had once been like this when Touji had said something about her pigtails making her look fat, but Asuka didn't know how to deal with her then, and she definitely didn't know how to deal with the girl in front of her.

"Wish I had a camera." Shinji's voice was heard by both of them, he sounded like he was back to his old self.

"Why is that Shinji?" Rei asked as she tried to smile.

"Because you actually look like your crying, and if I try to tell anyone, I'm going to need proof. That, and you look beautiful when you cry, like you aren't…just there, but alive and full of meaning." Shinji's head was buried into Rei's chest as she hugged him tightly.

'Jeez. This is the product of Third Impact? I think Shinji might have picked up some of his fellow stooges brain power while in limbo.' To say that Asuka was jealous was most definitely an understatement, but at this point she was too tired to care. She did want some answers though.

"Look Third." Her voice noticeably cut through the otherwise tender moment he and Rei were having. "I want to know what you've been dreaming about buster, but I'm too tired at this point, so lets get our sleeping bags set up and we'll just listen to it as our bedtime story, ok?"

Shinji thought about it for a second. He remembered the dream of course, but he didn't really want to tell these two about that. 'Rei might understand, but Asuka would most definitely go ballistic at the idea.' He finally just got up and started laying out Asuka's bag and got his own in place. He was trying to delay telling the dream, but Asuka wouldn't let it lay.

"Alright, were tucked in, now be a good boy and read us our bedtime story."

Shinji sighed one last time as he stared through the hole in the roof. "Fine, just…promise to listen to it all before you say anything."

Asuka was going to say something to the effect of perversion, but Rei preempted her. "We promise." Rei made sure to give Asuke the 'Shut the fuck up and listen' look, which worked rather well.

"So it starts back when I first came to Tokyo-3…"

The drive to NERV was anything but comforting, but Shinji was able hide the remains of the passenger 'Oh shit!' handle in his bag for later disposal.

"Come on, my driving isn't that bad! Besides we have to get you into—" Misato stopped because of the sensitivity of the area for the word she would have used. But she kept dragging the boy by his arm while she walked almost as recklessly as she drove down the hallway to the elevator.

"Get me into what?" 'I sure hope it's a bomb shelter so I'm safe from that….thing' Shinji mused but knew his hopes were for not. 'My father finally found a use for me, so I know he won't stick me in some box.'

"You'll find out soon enough!" She rounded another corner and continued walking. Rounded another corner, and another, and another, and another….

"You're lost."

Misato stopped and turned on the boy. "Of course we aren't!" She wasn't about to admit that they were, even if she knew that she was.

"Then why have we passed that corner for the fifth time?" Shinji made as he pointed back.

'How the….' Misato wondered as she finally gave in and grabbed one of the intercom phones to make one of the more embarrassing calls of the week.

--Skip forward—

"This is the Evangelion, the fruition of mankind's work, Unit-01!" The lights came up and showed the biomechanical beast.

"Um…who's the pilot?"

"You are." The light in the command bay above the hanger illuminated the one man's face Shinji hated. His father.

--Skip Forward—

"REI NO!" Shinji ejected his entry plug and ran over to Unit-00 which was laying in a smoldering heap with its own plug in Unit-01's hand. 'Please don't leave me, please don't leave…' Shinji kept saying in his head as he forced the panel open.

"Rei! Are you alive!?" His voice echoed throughout the plug and the angel inside slid her eyes slightly open.

"Don't say good bye before a mission, it's too sad…" Shinji's eyesight was now blocked by the tears. "If you are going to say something…say that I will see you later. Good bye is just too final."

"I don't know what I should do."

"A smile would be nice."

--Skip Forward—

"Dumkopf! Why can't you keep your perverted mind focused on the training. ARGH!!! No one can do this!"

"Fine, if you feel that way. Rei, how about you give it a try."

After watching the pair successfully complete the program, Asuka took Shinji aside later that night.

"Look, the only way we are going to be able to do this is to think about the same things. In order to do that, we need to know more about one another."

"A-Alright…"

"And don't think for a second that this is for one of your perverted dreams. The more we know about one another, the more alike we can think. That is all the more this is for."

"So…what do you want to know?"

"Well…are you gay?"

"WHAT?!?!?!"

--Skip Forward—

"None taken." A gunshot was heard as the blood from the man's head splattered against the wall. "Were going to Unit-01 Shinji." She took his hand and started to drag him to the Emergency elevators.

She was hit by a SEELE sidearm as she covered Shinji with her own body, but it didn't matter to her, she had died a long time ago. Now she was hearing him complain about some bullshit or another, and being an overall crybaby.

'Don't know if I can get him to pilot, but maybe there is one way.' She leaned in and kissed him deeply. It wasn't a simple kiss; both were lost in it until the elevator dinged behind them.

"That was an adult kiss. Let's do the rest later." 'Come back to me…' She thought as she pushed him into the elevator.

--Third Impact Limbo—

"Why did you leave me Shinji?" The Asuka in Shinji's mind demanded to know.

"I couldn't get to Unit-01! It was incased in Bakelite! It wasn't until mom activated it and moved the arm that it broke free…"

"Bull shit! I'm leaving your ass." She turned and started to walk away, just to be replaced by Rei.

"Why didn't you help me? You could have stopped Dr. Akagi from destroying my clones, now that I've died, there is no more of me on this earth. I could have learned so much."

"But Rei, I didn't even know you were a clone! How was I supposed to react to that knowledge?"

"Like a man, and stop her. Maybe your father was right to push you away, you coward." Rei turned and started to follow Asuka into the horizon.

"You didn't come back Shinji. I was willing to give myself to you. Sure you probably think I'm disgusting, and that I drink too much, but you made me feel safe and happy. Guess I was wrong to let down my shell to let you in. Good bye, Ikari."

Misato turned on her heal and followed Rei. Shinji didn't know what to do, but he did know he couldn't just let them go.

"Don't leave me! I love you! COME BACK!!!" No matter how fast he ran he just couldn't reach them.

--Beach of the LCL sea—

Shinji awoke to the world as it was after Third Impact. He immediately had to take a deep breath to keep from throwing up at the blood smell in the air. He couldn't help but throw up when he turned around and saw the charred landscape that used to be Japan. It was as he looked up the beach that he spotted Asuka.

'I can't let her see this…I love her, so I must….' The thought couldn't complete itself, but his actions would justify himself. At least that was going to be his story should some higher being were to ask him.

'I suppose as long as Rei and Asuka don't have to see this world, I can live with being in hell for the rest of eternity for killing you.'

"And you know the rest."

"Shinji…" Neither Rei or Asuka knew quite what to say. The dream he had recounted had really been nothing more than a series of replaying events from his times in Tokyo-3, but who wouldn't consider those days a nightmare unless they were insane?

Rei was the first to move towards the now quiet and quietly crying Shinji Ikari. She wrapped one arm around him and motioned for Asuka to get on the other side, which she did. Sure he was a pervert, but right now he was the only person on this planet she loved, which meant that if he loved her, Asuka would do anything for him.

After what seemed like an hour, but was really only a few minutes, the girls noticed he was dead asleep.

"Guess he overdid it today, huh?"

"Never helps that he had to suffer demonic punishment."

"Yeah. Third Impact was a bitch."

"Not what I meant, but we all need to get to sleep." Rei got up and moved Asuka's bag closer to Shinji and her own to the other side. "I know you might not like it, but I think it would be a good idea to sleep close together. For all our sakes."

"Right…Sounds like someone wants to get into Shinji's pants without him knowing it. Pervert." Asuka chuckled then yawned as she settled down to get some sleep.

"Not like you wouldn't ride him either." Rei said similarly.

"Almost…makes….you….feel………sorry…..for him."

Somewhere deep in Shinji's mind, alarms started going off. "Oh my God!!! How did I get into this situation!?!?" But like any other man, thoughts in this state were quickly forgotten and the alarms were shut off.

Shinji: WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING? I'M GOING TO GET RAPED AT THIS RATE!
Herald: I'm but the writer of the story, lol, and unfortunately you are the puppet through which I weave my tale.
Asuka: I AM NOT A DOLL!!! starts to strangle author
Rei: sweatdrops Um...well...right. Next chapter hopefully will be up soon, pending that CBS doesn't mess with Jericho anymore.