Chapter Nine


I decided my little sanctuary would have plush carpeting. I was glad of that, because I was lying on it. I replayed the conversation in my mind, endlessly. It became my new mantra, my new trance. I was so stupid. I should have found a way to change the subject. Something.

"Chuck?"

I didn't answer her. I curled up tighter, trying to shut the sensations of the outside world out. I didn't really need to do anything but lie there. Rei could pilot just fine. They didn't really need me.

"God damn it, answer me."

WHAT?

"Act your age."

DO YOU WANT SOMETHING

"I want to talk to you."

SO TALK

She was looking at the camera but I couldn't see her. I wasn't looking. I heard a soft clinking sound, glass on ceramic. The temptation to look burned like staring too long into the sun. I gave into it after a few seconds.

Ritsuko slumped in her desk chair. She had a mug on the desk but there was no coffee in it. Next to it was a bottle of heavy brown liquor. Serious shit. She took a long pull from the mug, set it down, and poured out some more, glug-glug, poured too fast, too much to be called a shot.

WHY ARE YOU DRINKING?

"Why not," she slurred. "What have I got to lose?"

EVERYTHING

She snorted, loudly, and tilted her head back. "Everything. What everything. I got nothing."

She leaned forward, poured more. Her hand was shaky.

YOURE GOING TO MAKE YOURSELF SICK

"So?"

ID RATHER YOU DIDNT

"What's the matter? Am I not good enough?" The last word sounded more like enouth. "Are you upset that your waifu has sagging tits and hasn't brushed her teeth in three days?"

She swirled the drink around in her mug, and downed it with a gulp. "You're lucky you can't smell me. I haven't had a shower in days."

RITSUKO

"What?"

I sat up, pulled myself into the chair. Visualized. Looked at her. Her eyes were bloodshot and there were red streaks on her cheeks and raw spots on her nose where she'd worried it with a tissue. I very dilberately looked at my mostly imaginary caps lock key and hit it. Focus.

Ritsuko.

"What? Hey, you made your words little."

Ritsuko, listen to me.

"I'm listeninth. What'dyou want?"

I want to tell you I'm sorry.

"Fer what?"

Everything.

"The other shith'th not your fault," she slurred. She almost missed the mug when she poured her next shot.

Ritsuko, you're having too much to drink.

"Bullshit," she snapped. "I used to drink with Mithatho. I can hold my liquor."

She looked at the bottle. "Besithides, who cares. I'm a dead woman."

I care.

She looked into the camera. She was swaying lightly, side to side.

"You might be the only one."

I'm sure I'm not.

"Feh. Misato is suspicious about me. I can see it. In her eyes," she pointed at her own eyes with her two fingers for emphasis. "She knows. Her college roomie is Mengele with tits."

You are not.

"I was lying before about the soul thing," she said, lip trembling. "Don't you think I know how the Evas work? We killed those women. Thirty of 'em. Horribly. There's recordings of it. For science. Of their screams."

She drained her mug, winced, stared into it, put it on the table. She missed, it teetered on the edge for a moment, slipped out of her hand. Shattered on the floor, a spreading sound like a wounded bell. She was leaning to the side.

"What am I supposed to do?" she said, shaking, eyes glittering with tears. "If I tell anyone they'll kill me. I always thought Gendo would protect me. I see what I mean to him now."

She sobbed, and it turned into a laugh. "Sometimes he's on me, in me, and he says her name. I pretend I don't hear."

She dragged her arm under her nose, wiping the snot on her sleeve. "He's the only one, you know. My first. I have that in common with Katsuragi. Neither one ofthuth hath had anything between our legs that doesn't run on batteries in yearth. 'Cept me."

You need to stop, Ritsuko. You're going to hurt yourself.

"So what?"

I don't want you to.

"Persistent, aren't you? I don't know what you thinith I am. You must not be seeing me."

You're the only thing I've seen since i woke up.

"Wha?"

Every time I wake up, you're there. Inches away from my face, or close enough. I'm so close to now I could be sitting in your lap.

"Be glad you're not," she snorted, breaking into a coughing laugh. "I stink."

I can't smell anything. Can't feel anything. All I have is you.

"Oh," she said, her voice dripping with cooing sarcasm, "How romantic. How long have you been working on that line?"

It's not a line.

"Sure it is," she said, sneering. "How pathetic can you be? Aren'tther any girlth in your universe?"

Lots.

"Oh, I thee how it is. I mutht be an eathy target. You already know eerrything about me, right?'

No, not really. Only bad things. I don't know your favorite food or your favorite color or your favorite song.

She put her hand on the bottle, closer her fingers around the neck, and stared at it.

Ritsuko, stop.

She slid closer to her, scraping the glass across her desk.

Ritsuko, don't take another drink.

She looked into the camera. "He called me tonight. Told me to be ready. Thaid I was busy."

Ritsuko, this isn't going to help.

"What do I say next time? How many times can I say no before he catches on?"

Catches on to what?

"That I don't want him fucking me anymore. I'm expendable, you know that. Ith how he keeps me in line. The carrot and the stick."

What stick?

She laughed, picked up the bottle, and cradled it to her chest, like an infant. "If I step out of line I'm dead. Or worse. Maybe they'll put me in one of those things. I don't have any children, but who cares? I never wanted any anyway."

She held the bottle in both hands and lifted it up. "You think if I chug thith it'll be enouth? Maybe I should use thith."

She reached under her desk, fumbled with a drawer. Pulled something out, dark and heavy and shiny, set it on the desk with a soft thunk. The gun sat there, heavy with impending finality. She stared at it.

Ritsuko, please. Don't.

"Give me one good reason."

We can stop this. You and me. I don't care what you've done, only what you will do. Think about it.

"Abouth what?"

I think I was sent here for a reason.

She laughed, but her hands relaxed, and the bottle slipped out of her hands and clattered to the floor. It was too heavy to shatter, but it landed with a loud crash and fell on its side. She winced at the sound and her arms tightened around herself. She chewed her lip.

Laughter bubbled out of her throat, sad and harsh.

"You think you can change anything? You think you can fix any of this?"

Yes. I do.

"They'll kill you."

I'm dead anyway.

"What do you mean?"

There are eleven more angels, Ritsuko.

"So?"

The sixteenth is the one that kills me.

She covered her mouth. Her eyes went wide. "How long have you know about this?"

You already know that.

"What do we do?"

Now? Nothing. The next fight will be at sea. We wait, and we prepare. Finish repairing me. Talk to me. Help me make a plan. I have some ideas.

"Like what?"

The pilots. The pilots are the key. Especially Rei.

"Rei is useless," Ritsuko hissed. "If she gets wind of you, the first thing she'll do is run and tattle to her puppemaster."

We'll see. I need you to put the gun away now.

Gingerly, she picked it up, holding the grip wrong, too losely, as if her finger might jump to the trigger on its own. I heard it thump in the drawer, and relief washed over me. I would have sighed if I'd been able.

"We need to be careful," she said. "You already took too big of a risk. If they learn one of the Evas is sentient and working against them, they'll kill you."

How?

"Don't joke about that. You know how vulnerable you are."

Can we do something about that?

"Maybe. I could loosen the restraints, but you still need power… and If I tinker with you too much, someone is bound to notice."

We'll figure it out. Right now I need you to get some sleep and sober up. Get something to eat.

"Yes, mother," she slurred, rolling her eyes. "I'm too fucked up to drive. I'll have to crash here."

She got up, stumbling. She left the camera on, all the better. I watched her move in and out of the frame, maddeningly unable to do anything but stare through it. She discarded her labcoat, came back into frame with a bag, vanished.

After a while she came back to the lab, hair wet from a shower, dressed in the baggy clothes from her bag. She pushed a line of side chairs together, the backs facing each other, taking oversized bites of a candy bar, washed it down with a soda.

When it was done she threw the trash into the bin, but the can bounced off the mountain of refuse already in there and rolled across the floor out of my sight. She crawled into the chairs, bundled her stained lab coat under her head, and rolled onto her side, facing me.

Her eyes fluttered closed. She was five feet away from the camera, but she may as well have been across the universe.