Part 7

"SHINJI, YOU IDIOT!!!!!"

"I'm sorry! I didn't realize—"

"You idiot! Don't talk, just stay quiet!" Asuka snapped, pacing back and forth, her hands balled up in fists as she glared venomously at her fiancé. It wasn't that she was really made at him, but it was a hell of a lot easier to shout at him than it was to shout at her sister over in Germany for calling her like that. Asuka was about to call her, too, once she found out what was up with Yumi drawing Ayanami. Still, the revelation that her sister had called while her back was turned was enough to make her forget momentarily about Wonder Girl. "You shouldn't have said you were my fiancé!"

"Why not?" Shinji asked.

"Because now I'm going to have to go back to Germany and drag you along with me," Asuka snapped.

"But I thought you felt Germany was the greatest nation in the world," Shinji replied, his eyes narrowed.

"Yeah, well, it is, but I hate having to see my parents!" The sounds of her father and stepmother making love echoed through her head, a sound superimposed to the memories of her mother in her hospital ward, stroking the doll she believed to be her daughter. She shook the memories out of her head before continuing her point. "They just bother me, alright?"

"Okay, fine, but you were going to have to tell them eventually," Shinji replied.

"Not necessarily," she replied.

"Were you just going to run away?"

"Don't throw that rhetoric at me, you stupid house broken male!" Asuka snapped, pointing at her fiancé with a look of utter disdain. Sure, his frail backbone was holding firm for this instance, but it wasn't enough to persuade Asuka that she was being unreasonable. He didn't know her family, nor did he know just why she wanted to avoid them like the plague. Then again, it wasn't his place to know. She had just wanted to keep him away from that side of her, and yet it had come to drag Shinji deeper into her tangled web of suffering. Sighing for a moment, inhaling in an attempt to calm herself, she said, her face beet red, "We need to figure out how we can do this."

"When are we going over there, again?"

#

"When was the last time you came over here?"

"Too long, Kate," Asuka had said in a falsely sweet sounding voice, speaking real, fluent German for the first time in months. She was surprised to hear a slight Japanese accent in her tone. She had been away from her motherland for too long, and yet, at the same time, was hesitant to go back there for years in fear she'd have to speak to her parents again.

"Well, I hear you have a fiancé," her sister Kate had replied in an inquisitive tone. Her sister wasn't like Asuka. As opposed to her, Kate lacked the fourth of Japanese blood her mother had given her. All she had was the Langley blood, but not the Sohryu blood. That's what made her different, made her an alien.

"Yeah, I've been meaning to tell you, but things have been so hectic I completely forgot," Asuka replied.

"I can imagine, what with wedding plans and all that. So who is the lucky man. Shinji? Isn't that the name of the Third Child?"

"Yes."

"Wow, I thought you said that guy was an idiot!"

"Well, he is. A complete and utter idiot, housebroken, stupid, and just—just—"

"Aw, it sounds adorable!" Kate had squealed. Asuka had cringed at the sound of her voice. She resented everything about that girl. It wasn't her fault she was her stepmother's daughter, but that didn't mean she'd just accept Kate with open arms or anything. "So when's the wedding?"

"What?"

"The wedding. When is it?"

"Oh, that. Well, we're planning on having it in a few months."

"When are you guys planning on having a baby?"

"A little under nine months."

She did despise slips of the tongue.

"What was that?"

"Nothing! Nothing at all," Asuka replied, frantically, "I didn't say anything!"

"Did you say nine months?"

There was no point now. She might as well just bite the bullet. Resenting her sister's inquisitive nature with a wave of fury, damning Shinji for getting her into this situation, she said, in an uncharacteristically high voice, "Uh, well, I said less than nine months."

"What? Tell me everything. Now."

"Well, you know, stuff happened, and, uh, Kate! Stop giggling!" she snapped, her face filling with a radiant scarlet glow.

"I can't help it! It's just too rich! You a mother!"

"Oh shut up!"

"So when're you coming over to introduce your fiancé?"

Asuka had sighed, shaking her head. She had ran a hand through her hair, wondering when a good time would be. She wouldn't have minded coming over on February 30th, or maybe the day after the End of Time. However, she couldn't just say that to her sister. She glanced over at Shinji, considering for a moment to ask him for advice, only to turn away, harshly. That bastard was the reason she was put into this situation; the last thing she wanted was to hear his voice right now. "I don't know. What time's good for you?"

"Hang on a sec. Mom wants to talk to you." Asuka had cringed yet again. Just what she needed, her damn stepmother on the line. Clenching her fists into tight little balls, she had waited until that little brat deposited the phone in her mother's hands, only to count the seconds until that dreaded voice rang through the phone.

"Hello, dear?" At the sound of that voice, the woman had become a girl once more, a girl running through German air, running toward a door beyond which remained a dead corpse hanging from the rafters. She had held the memories at bay as she had focused on the then and there, in Japan, in Tokyo-3, NOT in Germany.

"Hello, mother!" Asuka had called out in a forced cheery tone, "How are you?"

"What's this I hear about you getting married?"

She did indeed cut straight to the point. Recovering from her momentary stunned silence, she had replied, with a forced smile on her face and a force girlish laugh in her voice, "Aw, sorry I didn't tell you before. So much has happened lately I've just forgotten to tell you that sort of thing. I hope you can forgive me." Oh how she had just wanted to tell that stupid bitch that she had avoided calling her this whole time. Had it not been for that idiot picking up the phone, she'd still avoid communication with that woman. It wasn't like she was her real mother anyway.

"It's quite alright. I suppose I can forgive you, but next time, please tell your family about such major developments, alright?"

"Sure, okay."

"Such as you going about and making me a grandmother without ever informing me."

Asuka had wanted to shout out that her stepmother could rest assured that she wasn't the baby's grandfather and that Kyoko Sohryu was the legitimate grandmother, but, once again, she held that indignation inside of her chest as she had replied, in a sugary tone, "I'm sorry about that too!"

"So who is this man, anyway?"

"Oh, Shinji Ikari."

"Oh, you mean that pilot you worked with?"

"The same."

"We're all very proud of what you did as a child, you know. I think all of Germany would rejoice at your wedding." Truthfully, judging by how the NERV building was damaged in Japan, she seriously doubted that any nation would rejoice about the union of two small individuals. Clearly her stepmother was trying to play up her pride, an aspect of herself that had deflated gradually over the years. Regardless, it did boost her spirits up slightly, if only for a moment.

"Oh, I doubt that," Asuka had replied, honestly, "Anyway, it's been great talking to you, but I'm going to have to—"

"When will you be coming over to introduce us to the Third Child?"

The moment she had hoped to avoid. "Oh, uh, I don't know, I have a lot of work to do, so I don't know when I'll be able to get over there."

"You can arrange something with your superiors, I'm sure. I'm sure they let people off for brief vacations and maternity leave and the like."

This was very true. They did let Misato off TWICE for maternity leave, AND took several vacations to spend time with her children, and she had a higher position than either of them did. Fuyutsuki would have no problem giving them time off to visit Germany, much to her dismay. "I'll need to ask." No doubt she'd forget to ask Fuyutsuki and end up replying to her mother that her boss was a jerk that refused to let her take time off. That sounded like a good alibi, until her stepmother spoke.

"Don't worry. I'll just have your father make a call for you."

Damn it! That bitch thought of everything, didn't she? "What? Oh, I don't think you'd need to go to all that trouble!"

"Oh, no trouble at all! He was going to need to have a telephone conference with your Commander Fuyutsuki regardless in order to settle an affair regarding a German railway system. I'm sure if he asked your boss he'd be delighted to help."

"Oh, really, you don't need to go to that much trouble—"

"No trouble at all! Shall I request that you're available for, say, two weeks from today so you'd be able to get your affairs in order?"

"Oh, that should be fine," Asuka resigned.

"Good. I'll see you in a bit, then. Gute Nacht!"

#

"Two weeks, huh?" Shinji replied, in stunned silence, "That's a little quick."

"She'll hold us to it, you know. There's no way I can avoid it," Asuka sighed in resignation.

"It can't be that bad, can it?" Shinji replied, "I mean, you knew this was going to happen sooner or later, so you might as well go ahead and reach out for it." Shinji had never heard the German mention much about her family, so this reaction she had didn't exactly surprise her. The sister hadn't sounded mean on the phone, and the conversation she had with her mother—er, stepmother—didn't sound too unpleasant, so why was it so difficult for her to actually muster the courage to see them? It just didn't add up. Maybe it had something to do with her birthmother.

"What do you think I should do now?" Asuka asked Shinji in a desperate tone.

#

"What do you think I should do now?" Asuka had cried out as fists had beat against the door of the NERV building.

"I don't know! Grab something! Anything! Barricade the door!" Shinji had shrieked, grabbing every sort of reinforcement he could grab his hands on as he jammed it against the locked door, be it metal bars, pieces of wood, or even dead bodies that had begun to pile up along the ground, the dead bodies riddled with bullets, bodies of comrades who they had allied themselves with along their escape from the concentration camp. It was at moments that these that he was glad that their now dead comrades had the foresight, and the bravery, to sacrifice their lives in order to disable their weapons.

Shinji glanced over his shoulder, seeing bloody masses of bodies, some still alive, most dying, many younger than he was. Their wide, terrified eyes staring at the banging beyond the door, a pulsating rhythmic slamming that was almost in synch with Shinji's own heartbeat, powerfully beating against the interior of his ribcage as he reinforced the door, praying that they'd live, praying that he'd be able to build up the walls between him and the enemy long enough for them to escape.

Was this any different from the battles against the Angels? Was it? They were relentless, maybe even worse, maybe just as dangerous. He needed to face his fears and save himself. Otherwise, what did he really learn after all that horror three years earlier in Third Impact?

And over his gasping for air, his terrified attempts to live, he could hear the once proud German whispering to herself, in terrified, harsh tones: "I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die."

They weren't going to die.

Not like this.

They were closed off in a tiny little room, filthy, bloodstained, and defenseless. There was no hope for survival if those doors gave. They had to make sure it was impossible for the enemy to get in, for those monsters to penetrate their sanctuary. The militia was just a new government that had hoped to regain power in the collapsed regime. Like most of the horrible, destructive groups, it had united under a relatively peaceful philosophy: eliminating evil. A good idea in theory, except the leader, a Jewish zealot, had a deep seated grudge against the Germans because of the Holocaust. Once again, in and of itself, not a terrible opinion. The Nazis had done horrible things to the Jews. However, like all believes, no matter how pure, when pushed to its extreme, it became rotten. The zealot had decided that all Germans were secretly Nazis, and that, in order to avoid a second Holocaust of Jews, he needed to create a Holocaust of Germans. They created dozens of concentration camps just like the Nazis had, all for the same intention: tormenting and killing their enemies.

Shinji became involved when Asuka had been captured, and he along with her for being a "German lover."

They had been sent out by the then unofficial NERV to help with the peace effort, and now they were dragged into a damn war! He just wanted the banging to stop. He wished his mother was there, that Ayanami was there, to save them, to maybe salvage them from the wreckage. But he couldn't wish for miracles now. He had received his fair share of miracles already. There was no time for praying; the time to act was nigh.

And then he heard it: gunshots. Gunshot after gunshot echoed through the air, and the sounds of bodies hitting the floor rang even through the thick defenses. Regardless of the gunfire and screams of zealots, Shinji didn't dare lower his guard. There was always a chance the conflict outside would be resolved. He knew the zealots couldn't be the ones shooting, as they didn't have anymore firearms to use. Surely it was a rival militia, perhaps worse than the last. He wouldn't give in now. Maybe, with a bit of lucky, they'd leave the facility alone and let them make a safe escape. Just maybe the zealots would forget about the escapees and let them return to Tokyo-3 safely. Even though it wasn't stable yet, it was a hell of a lot better than Europe right now! Even America would be safe, but Europe was a hell hole at the present time that no one should have the misfortune to dwell in.

And then there was silence. For a moment, Shinji didn't breathe. For five moments, there was silence. And, after the sixth moment, Shinji drew breath. Turning to his comrades, he said, in a harsh tone, "I think we made it."

#

"When was the last time you were even in Germany?" Shinji asked, curiously.

"Well, in the Concentration Camp," Asuka replied.

"Yeah, but that militia is gone now, so I know that's not what's bothering you," Shinji replied.

"Yeah, because crazy people trying to kill me is something you just forget after a few days."

"Asuka."

"Alright, I just don't want to see my parents. Is that so horrible? You didn't want to see your father after all!"

Once again, the image of himself in the future dominating his child like his own father had dominated him flashed in Shinji's mind. He suppressed the image, only to focus on his fiancé once more, a slightly anxious expression on her face. "What's wrong? You can talk to me about it if it really bothers you."

"It's nothing."

"No it's not."

"Really, don't worry about—"

"Here you are just running away from your problems again. I thought you outgrew that, you idiot."

Frowning again, Shinji replied, distantly, "I'm just afraid I'll end up being just as good of a father as mine was."

"How so?"

"Well, I know I won't be nearly as bad of a dad as he was, I just can't shake the feeling that I'll somehow hurt my child, or maybe he'll hurt me alternatively because I'm afraid of hurting him. I don't know what to think, but I'm just afraid something bad will happen because I wouldn't know what to do."

The redhead examined him with a raised eyebrow before drawing nearer. She lazily flicked him in the forehead, at which she snapped, "Dummkopf! You're stupider than I thought if that's what you're worried about being like that idiot."

"How is it stupid? It's a very legitimate fear!"

"Well, tell me this: are you going to emotionally abandon your kid?"

"No."

"Are you going to make him pilot a gigantic robot?"

"I don't think so."

"Are you going to focus on a creepy blue haired girl more than him?"

"Not likely."

"Then you'll be fine. What're you worried about?" Asuka replied, sitting back on her bed, exhaling slowly as she muttered to herself, "But my mother, on the other hand…"

"What was that?"

"Nothing. I was just thinking about my mother—er, I mean, stepmother."

"Oh, okay," Shinji replied, convinced, "I'm guessing you don't get along with her?"

"Yeah, I suppose."

"Do you want to talk about it?" Shinji asked.

Smiling slyly, Asuka replied, "Dummkopf! If I started telling you everything wrong with me, then I'd really realize I'm in a pathetic state."

"So I can tell you things, but not the other way around?"

"Basically. Now go to bed. We have two weeks before we go to Hell."