It was so surreal, being in that train that led nowhere, from infinity to infinity. Going round and round on those rail tracks that rested above nothing. Being there, in that never ending dusk in the middle of space, it was so dreamlike, and yet so real. Shinji was there on that train and so was Ayanami. He knew this scenario from before, it played many times in his head: Rei was about to confront him, just like she always did when he found himself sitting inside that train again and again.

"Why do you pilot Eva?"

"Shut up, I don't wanna hear it..."

"Why do you pilot Eva?"

"I said shut up!"

"Are you going to keep running away?"

"I said shut up!!"

Shinji grabbed her by the neck, choking her with his hands, but then something happened. He was choking Asuka now. Shinji's eyes widened in fear and confusion seeing Rei suddenly morph into his redheaded colleague. It happened again, now Asuka became Misato. Shinji gasped as he kept on slowly killing these people he knew so closely, or this transforming entity in this unreal world. As Misato kept on losing air and dying in Shinji's hands, she turned lastly into Gendo who had his stern and cold expression even under his son's deadly grip. When he saw his father's face, Shinji screamed. A sudden rush of anger, shame and guilt overwhelmed him in seeing his father there in front of him. He let go and kicked him backwards, smashing his back against the train's window. The glass gave out, shattered, and all that Shinji saw was his father, or whatever that was, go through and fall out of the train. Seconds passed before Shinji ran over to the broken window, realizing what he had just done. However his father was gone, he wasn't on the tracks or free falling into the endless space. It almost as if the incident never happened, but the glass bits were still on the floor and the window was still missing.

At the end of the train car, the door leading to the conductor's cabin opened. The sun shone right through the opened door into Shinji's eyes. The glare was so strong he had to squint to look at the entrance. Shinji kept watching curiously with his hands shielding his eyes from the golden sun, waiting for someone or something to come out, and then he heard a voice come from the inside the cabin. It was a man's voice, it sounded familiar, he just didn't know whose it was.

"Now why did you do that?"

"What?"

"I saw you, you tried to strangle all those girls, and then you kicked that man out the train window. Why would you do such a thing?"

Shinji was scared, scared like someone would get if they were caught shoplifting by the police, multiplied by ten. His whole body began to shake; even his eyes did so under that sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach. Regret and guilty took him over, he was frozen there hoping if he kept still, he would become invisible or disappear, but he wasn't.

"I, I don't know…"

"You almost killed three people, you killed that man, and you don't know why?"

"I-I…"

"…Well?"

"I… they… I can't face them anymore!"

A silhouette of a man leaned out the cabin door covering the sun's glare. Shinji couldn't see who he was, the sun's projection through the glass made for a dark blurry image of this stranger with golden rays gleaming from his outline.

"Why? What did they do to you?"

Shinji felt his stomach twisting more and more as this dark stranger kept prying him. Shinji looked down, ready to burst into tears, and unable to answer because he wasn't sure of the answer himself.

"You said you can't face them anymore… Or is it yourself that you can't face?"

"(gasp)…" it was all that Shinji managed to say.

"… What about your father? You definitely have strong feelings towards him, since you kicked him out the train window… Do you hate him?"

"No… I… Yes… Yeas…! I hate him!!"

"… Because he doesn't return your love?

Shinji began to cry. He dropped to his knees and began to sob into his palms. The truth burned him so.

"Are you also scared of no one wanting you, accepting you?"

"Yes!"

"… So what are you going to do about it?"

Shinji kept on letting his tears rain down onto the floor, face reddened, choking on his own sadness.

"Are you going to stay there on your knees? You're not going to get up?"

"No (sniff) what's the point anymore? (sniff) I'm worthless, a coward…"

"… Then there's no reason for you to live is there?"

Shinji didn't answer, his silence showed his agreement, but inside part of him was screaming 'no'. He just stared at the floor, watching his tear drops on the cold metal he knelt on.

The dark stranger stood there watching the teen for a minute before he shut the cabin door. The metal door made a metal grinding noise as it shut, followed by a loud thud and the sound of a lock being turned. Shinji didn't budge. A moment later, the train began to gain speed, faster and faster. Shinji looked up at the closed door,

"What are you doing? Why are we going so fast?"

The train began to shake more and more. Shinji jumped to his feet and ran for the locked door.

"Hey stop! This is too fast, were gonna crash! You're going too fast!"

His face still marked with water trails from crying, now had a panicked look. Adrenaline and fear powered him now as he slammed his hand on the cabin door, hoping to quickly get a response from the man. Sparks began to fly off the train wheels as it began to gain more speed and shake violently. Seeing those sparks made Shinji more scared, as he was sure the train wasn't meant to produce them. There was rumbling, sounds of metal creaking and breaking, and 'chug chug' noise produced by the trains wheels were now playing at much higher tempo.

"I'm serious, stop the train!! We're gonna crash!!"

"You had your chance Shinji. No one's going to help you now."

"Just stop the damn train!!"

"… No… Only you can stop it from derailing…"

"I can't!! You locked the door!!"

"When a door shuts close on you, do you always whine and complain? Do you always wait for someone to help you open it? Fuck that, you need to open this yourself if you want to live."

"Don't do this!! Please stop!!"

"… You disappoint me Shinji…"

The train made a turn. It became silent, all the noise was gone, and all the sparks and loud metal had calmed down. The train had come of the rails; it tilted sideways and rolled off. Shinji was violently bashed against the wall as the train barrel rolled out of its tracks into the air. His arm and ribs hurt from the impact, he moaned and groaned before he realized he was free falling inside the car. It kept going down in a spiral manner and all that could bee seen and heard was the wind whistle. Seconds later, ground thousands of feet under became visible. Shinji saw the landscape fading in his vision out the window. He couldn't believe he was about to die, right there inside that metal casing, and there's was nothing he could do, he couldn't fight gravity like he could against an angel. It was a guaranteed death. The earth was getting closer and closer; maybe he had five seconds left before crashing. In that moment, right before hitting the ground, when the train was about twenty feet away from crashing, Shinji heard a faint, whispering voice. It was Asuka's voice he heard,

"Whose fault is this?"

In that critical moment, just a tenth of a second from a splatter death, he woke up.

He even fell out of the sofa as he woke up in panic, with his eyes almost as wide as his mouth as he screamed, all sweaty and unsure where he was. He rolled off the edge of the sofa and did a hard face plant on the carpet. Shinji never had a dream, or nightmare, like that before; it was unlike anything he ever experienced before,

"Ooowww… Shit…"

It took him a second to get up, as he still wasn't one hundred percent conscious yet, still having that in between dream/reality experience when someone gets up in the morning. Shinji lifted himself up and sat against the sofa since he didn't recover all his strength yet. It was nighttime, and the rainstorm which had evolved into a thunderstorm was still pressing on. The constant shower kept on going as if it had an infinite source of water hailed down from heaven. Those dark, gray clouds had now become black and violent, lighting the sky with its blue lightning rods and masking any sound with its godly thunder. The rain beat so hard against the living room window, that the possibility of it breaking wasn't too far fetched. Shinji stretched out his arms with a long, deep yawn that produced a tear on his eyelid. The television was still on from morning,

"Now I've tried Hair-ty-Gro, and let me tell you, it works one hundred percen-tile…!"

Turns out he had the paid programming channel on all day. He reached for the remote and turned off the television. Taking one last yawn, he got up and went to the kitchen to check the time. Nine seventeen was on the microwave, which surprised Shinji. He had been asleep for almost twelve hours; not including the ones he slept at night, but what he couldn't stop thinking about was that nightmare. What was it about, and who was that man on the train. He had a dream where Rei questioned him before, and he hated that dream, but this one was different, it was much deeper. That man on the train wasn't someone he knew, someone who had any affiliation with him, that man didn't care for him, but he wanted something from Shinji, but he didn't know what.

Lightning struck the somewhere in the city, and a thunder followed it. It distracted Shinji from his pondering. He looked outside, but he couldn't see anything through the raindrops smashing against the veranda glass door. All he saw was flashing from the lightning, and blurred lights from the city. Breaking away from his thoughts, Shinji scanned the kitchen with his eyes to find it a complete mess,

"(Sigh)… Better clean everything up before Misato gets back…"

That reminded him, had Asuka come home? He walked to her room, but she wasn't present. He looked at the bathroom door, but there was no light coming from the slit under it,

"I guess she's not home…"

She probably stayed at Hikari's that night, he figured. He returned to kitchen and picked up a couple of house cleaning products from the bottom cabinets. The rain and the storm raged on, but Shinji didn't mind it, he simply began his house duties with the sink,

"Is she not here… because of me?"

Shinji started to feel down again, but it wasn't that bad this time. Part of him wasn't really 'giving a shit' to say the least.

"Thanks for letting me stay the night Hikari."

"Sure Asuka. You're always welcome here."

Hikari reached inside her bedroom closet and pulled out two futons. She handed one to Asuka, and they set them next to each other. Before slipping under her blanket, Hikari turned off the light and rushed to her futon. All that lit up the room was darkness and lightning. The sound of the rain beating against the widow in that room wasn't chaotic, it was more soothing.

"Asuka…"

"Yeah?"

"Why didn't you wanna go home today?"

"I just… me and Misato got into a fight this morning. She was bitching about my piloting."

"… I see."

"It's no big deal, I'm sure everything will be fine by tomorrow…"

"Well, good night Asuka."

"Good night Hikari."

Asuka turned on her side while gripping her blanket. She had a sad look in her eyes,

"… Idiot…" was all she said before closed her eyes. The rain made for a nice lullaby that night.

--Thanks for reading again. Feel free to comment and give advice.--