Disclaimer: I don't own Evangelion.

-Matsushiro, Japan. Nerv Branch 02. The first of February, 2016-

Fuyutski was woken by a guard knocking on his cell door. "It's time." The guard said simply as he opened the cell door. Fuyutski knew what was coming; he kicked aside a food tray on his cell floor and stepped out of the cell.

Once outside the guard cuffed him and began to lead Fuyutski through several hallways, occasionally people would mutter as they passed by him, some even sneered, finally the guard stopped at a door and knocked; a moment later it opened and a slightly harried looking Misato stepped through. "You took your sweet time huh?" She asked the guard playfully.

"Yes Ma'am I suppose I beg your pardon." He responded curtly with a salute.

Misato was still grinning, "At ease soldier, you're dismissed; I'll handle the prisoner from here." The guard dropped his salute and marched off.

Prisoner and warden' eyes met then Misato pushed Fuyutski back. "Get walking. I'll be taking you to the execution grounds. If you have any final words I'll deliver them." She said savagely.

Fuyutski could hear the malice in her voice; he wanted to give some sort of reasoning for his actions. "I can understand that you're angry Major Katsuragi, but-"

He was cut off by Misato who corrected him "I'm a Brigadier General now, so please address me as such."

For a man about to be executed Fuyutski was impressed. "You were promoted by three ranks? That's very impressive, you have my congratulations."

Misato was quick to respond. "Don't give me your congratulations, you used all of us at Nerv, as far as I'm concerned you're getting what's coming to you." She said harshly.

"Yes I am. I do not deny that." Said Fuyutski sounding resigned to his fate.

Misato was surprised at his acceptance but still she pushed him along. They had come to a stop before a large set of double doors, Misato stepped forward and pushed them open, Fuyutski shied away as the sun hit his eyes, but Misato ushered him through. Outside there were several soldiers wearing UN uniforms who saluted the Brigadier General, she led Fuyutski ten yards away from the soldiers and blindfolded him.

Once he was blindfolded Fuyutski could hear Misato step away and begin to speak with the soldiers. Finally he heard her speak. "Kozo Fuyutski. By special war tribunal you have convicted of crimes against humanity and have been sentenced to death by firing squad. Do you have any final words?"

Fuyutski thought it best to get it over with. "No."

Several tense seconds passed then Fuyutski heard Misato clearly state "Ready!" followed by the sounds of guns being leveled.

Fuyutski couldn't help but reflect upon his life, he wanted to re-experience the days when he was teaching Yui, he wished he could have done so many things differently. He wished he could have been more aggressive and stolen Yui away from Gendo.

His thoughts were interrupted by Misato as she ordered the soldiers. "Aim!"

Fuyutski's mind began reeling, he wished he could have stopped Yui from taking part in the contact experiment that bonded her to Evangelion 01, all of his perceived failures and hopes flooded his mind until the very moment that drove all everything away.

"Fire!"

Fuyutski didn't even hear the gunshots, pain flooded through his body; still blindfolded he fell to the ground bleeding. Fuyutski knew he was dying. His last thoughts were of Yui and how wonderful she looked at the very moment of Third Impact. As his consciousness faded he remarked to himself. "At least I saw her one more time."

-Massachusetts, Boston. 7:15 AM Eastern Standard Time, Tuesday; The second of February, 2016-

Daniel Balch woke up to his alarm blaring, he slowly sat up in his bed and got used to being awake, he looked at his alarm sleepily and shut it off. "I still wanna sleep." He said lazily and got back under the covers; he closed his eyes and was just drifting off when the worst possible thing happened

"It's time to get up Daniel! Come on! I'll make you some breakfast!" Daniel's father Gregory hollered while hammering on his door.

Daniel was really feeling tired, he attempted in vain to block out the sound of his father hammering on his door.

"I let you skip school yesterday you better be coming down soon!" He called again.

Daniel couldn't argue with his father's logic and he was sure he wouldn't be able to get back to sleep again so he pushed himself out of bed and slowly made his way downstairs to the kitchen. As soon as Daniel began walking downstairs the scent of bacon and eggs hit him; he realized he was quite hungry and began to shuffle along a bit faster.

Daniel reached the kitchen and sat down at the table where a plate of bacon, eggs and a cup of coffee greeted him.

"Eat up quick, and then go get ready for school; I'll drop you off before I head in to work." Gregory said with some excitement in his voice.

Daniel wasn't sure but he could sense that his father seemed more excited than usual this morning; almost like he was expecting something. "Dad, are you expecting something? I know you're a morning person but you seem practically giddy."

His dad regarded him for a moment then broke into a smile, "Should I tell you? I don't know, I was told to keep it a surprise." He teased.

Daniel was amused. "That's a nice suit you're wearing today, I wonder what would happen if it got some grease on it…" He wondered out loud, while brandishing a piece of bacon on his fork.

His father play defended himself with his hands and laughed "No way! This suit is new!

Daniel shook the piece of bacon at him.

"Alright alright, your mom is coming back today! I'll be picking her up from the airport later this afternoon. She told me to keep it a surprise for you, so you better act surprised when she gets here." He revealed.

Daniel was stunned; last he knew his mother was chosen by her work at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to work as a Bio-Engineer for some state of the art Biological Metaphysics Company based in China. "Wait, what? I thought Emm- Ah I mean Mom was still contracted to work in China for at least another year."

He stopped as his father was glaring at him, his father rarely got upset but Daniel could see that not using his mother's name had annoyed him. "Her name is Emma; you call her mom, especially when you see her later today." He said sternly.

Daniel's father was a nice guy; he was tall and had a muscular build with messy dark hair that was in the process of graying. He was a very talented lawyer that worked at a law firm based in Boston until his wife, Emma, got contracted by a China based Biophysics company. When she left for China, he still tried his best to make time for Daniel. Even without Emma around he usually had a very upbeat personality and always made an effort to encourage and support Daniel. Daniel really did appreciate his father's cheery attitude even though he didn't always show it. Daniel was sure he had upset his father and did feel bad about it so he apologized, finished up his cup of coffee, and walked back up to his room to get ready for school.

When Daniel reached his room he threw off his pajamas and threw on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. After doing so he looked himself over in a mirror.

His build was lanky. "I need to get more exercise or something." he commented, his brown eyes moved up to his short dark hair which was messy. "Maybe I should brush my hair or use gel." Next he got to his most sensitive feature. "I'm still too short." He frowned. "I wanna be taller! Both my parents are tall. Why am I so short!" He thought of his friends. "They're all getting taller…" He obsessed to himself.

Finally he sighed and figured that he better get downstairs or he'd be late for school.

From the moment he got to school the day felt like a blur, he couldn't keep his full attention on his lessons and he eventually started to think about his mom. The last time he'd seen her was a full two years ago. Daniel tried and tried but he found it very hard to remember the fine details of her face. He knew his teacher hated cell phones in class but Daniel was curious so he flipped out his cell phone and scrolled back to one of the very first pictures he received on his phone. As soon as the picture loaded he noticed how different he looked from his mother, very straight, light brown hair, soft features, blue eyes, and uncharacteristically tall for a woman.

He looked for another moment until he realized that the lecture had stopped and his teacher was looking right at him. "Daniel! No cell phones in class." His teacher barked.

"Sorry Sir!" Daniel said as he snapped his phone shut and pushed it into his pocket.

"Well then, would you please come up to the board and solve this problem." His teacher said sternly while pointing to a complex algebra problem. "Uh… sure." Daniel said as he slowly walked up to the white board. Algebra was never Daniel's forte but he tried his best at the problem. "So you see, X equals 32." Daniel said to his teacher.

His teacher, Mr. Carroll, was unusually stern for a public school teacher and usually wore a gray suit with square rimmed glasses. Both of which seemed to magnify his ability to make math boring. Daniel felt that it wasn't because he was a bad teacher; it seemed that he just lacked energy while teaching.

Professor Carroll looked over the problem quickly and nodded, "Go ahead and sit back down. Next time I see you with a cell phone in class its detention." Daniel nodded and returned to his seat after which the class grinded on at its usual rate.

Finally the bell rang and Daniel began to leave the classroom until he was stopped by Mr. Carroll, "Daniel, please wait for a moment." He said kindly.

Daniel just hoped he wasn't going to be given detention. "Yes, Professor?" Daniel just wanted to get whatever it was out of the way so he could go home.

"Several of my colleagues over at MIT are saying that Emma is coming back today." Mr. Carroll gave a rare smile. "I worked with her when she was writing her dissertation; I just wanted to ask you to have her give me a call if you could. I'd like to catch up with her." He chuckled. "Hell with her being gone for two years I bet you two have a lot of catching up to do."

Daniel was astonished that the teacher who always seemed so impersonal was asking about his personal life, at the moment Mr. Carroll seemed like he was light years away from his in-class persona. "Yeah I do have a lot of questions to ask her!" Daniel smiled and continued "I'll make sure she gives you a call." Daniel said as he turned to leave.

"Thank you Daniel, make sure you ask her to teach you some better algebra skills." His teacher joked.

Daniel grinned and answered back "Alright, I'll ask her that for sure, but only if you ask her to give you some advice on how to put some energy into your lessons."

After talking with Mr. Carroll, Daniel checked his watch, it was 4:15, and Daniel knew that unless he rushed he wouldn't be able to make the bus back home, so he sprinted out to the bus stop and just barely managed to get there before it left. The ride back to his home was uneventful but Daniel was excited at the prospect of finally seeing his mother again. After he got off the bus, he walked the short distance to his home and stopped just before opening the door. Daniel looked himself over, took a deep breath and pushed the door open.

The house was mostly dark so Daniel turned on a few lights and called out, "Is anyone here?" Daniel waited but there was no answer. He figured that maybe his father had taken his mom out for dinner, "Can't believe they wouldn't take me." He said to himself, but still he grinned and turned on the television. A few hours later it was 8 o'clock and Daniel had called his father several times but had received no replies. Daniel was just about to give up and go to his room when he heard the door open.

Daniel's heart was thumping so fast he could feel it in his chest and as he crossed the threshold into the living room he saw his father opening the door for someone to come in, but this someone wasn't Daniel's mother. She was a stout little Chinese woman wearing beige office attire with long black hair. Her face was wrinkly and it reminded Daniel of a turtle.

"Dad… what's going on, and who is this?" He said while pointing at the woman.

His father was looking grim, "Maybe you should sit down Son, and I'll go make our guest some tea." He said looking very perturbed.

Daniel was still confused; his father wasn't the type to act like this. Daniel watched as his father walked over to the kitchen and as Daniel turned his attention back to his "guest" he found her looking over her house with what looked like a mixture of distaste and boredom. He didn't bother saying anything he just waited until his father returned to the room.

"Here you go." He said as he handed the woman a mug with some black tea in it. She looked it over and started to drink quietly. "So would you please explain the situation to us?" Gregory said.

The turtle looking lady looked him over for a moment then began to speak in perfect English. "Well you see, my name is Li Hua and I am here to represent the Shen Corporation who contracted one Emma Balch to work at our Beijing branch. Yesterday your wife was asked to assist our lead scientist in performing a simple experiment involving a next generation energy recouping device."

Both Daniel and his father stared blankly at the stranger. "A what?" Daniel couldn't help but say.

"In simple terms it is a component that could be installed in any device that would save energy and in turn promote efficiency." She said slowly as if she was explaining the concept to a child, she continued. "You see during this test the device malfunctioned and discharged the energy it was attempting to retain." She took a deep breath and looked very nervous as she continued to speak. "It's never easy to say these type of things, but your wife was struck by the energy this device released, she is currently in a coma and being cared for at our facility."

Daniel couldn't believe what he was hearing. "You mean she was going on vacation and you people had her participate in some test anyway!" Rage flowed through him; he didn't trust this stupid looking woman. "What kind of cutting edge lab doesn't take precautions!" He stopped as his father cleared his throat and began to speak calmly.

"Daniel is correct, why would you ask her to be involved with an experiment when she had made it clear that she was leaving for a vacation the following day?"

The woman looked at both Daniel and his father, sighed and then responded. "Our lab is one of the leaders in producing and developing world changing biochemical and energy saving products; please do not imply that we did not take precautions. The accident that occurred was unprecedented; we had no way of seeing this coming. That said we will be taking full responsibility for what happened. We are prepared to settle your wife's contract."

Daniel was disgusted; he didn't want to hear someone try to bargain with him while knowing that his mother was hurt somewhere. "I don't want to hear this." He said slowly as he got up to leave. All Daniel wanted to do was go to bed early. As he walked back up to his room he could hear what sounded like a heated argument between his father and Li Hua.

When Daniel got to his room he didn't even bother to change into his pajamas and as he passed his mirror he didn't comment on his height. He fell onto his bed fully dressed and tried to forget about what had just happened.

Chapter end.

If you have any questions feel free to ask them at

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