Neon Genesis Evangelion

Pilot's Table

By D.A.

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Title: I want Shinji
Prompt: Set 1 / Prompt 39 (Remember)
Word Count: 1295
Rating: T
Summary: Hikari and Kensuke talk of Shinji and his Eva.

Disclaimer: I do not own Neon Genesis Evangelion or anything connected to it.

Notes: Continuation of "Loss" (chapter6).

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She was going to have a talk with that purple monster…

Hikari stormed down the hallway in Nerv. She wasn't sure which hall anymore, only that the signs were pointing her in the direction of the Evangelion Cages.

She wasn't just storming down Nerv's corridors, though, but the corridor of her memories as well.

000

"Touji!" Hikari screamed as she ran down the hallway outside Asuka's old apartment. The fiery redhead had left last week to Pilot the rebuilt Unit-02 in defense of Nerv-Berlin before Russia made a run at the advanced base.

Touji dropped out of sight, and Hikari did the same as an RPG slammed into the building two floors down from where they were.

"Hikari! Get outta here!" Touji bellowed, leaning slightly over the wall holding a modified AK-74 in his eighteen-year old hands, and fired a burst at the heavily-armed terrorists.

Several rounds bounced off the concrete walls around the two teens as Hikari tried to crawl over to Touji.

000

The last thing Hikari could remember from that day had been a deafening roar, and blackness.

She had woken up in the Nerv Medical Recovery Ward. Misato had come in and told her she would be alright. When Hikari had pressed her about Touji, Misato had explained with tear-filled eyes that he had been in the center of a RPG explosion.

Hikari had cried herself to sleep for the next year and a half before she could think about Touji without bursting into tears, and if what Asuka had said about seeing Shinji was true, then the german had never had chance to heal.

000

"Hey, uh… Sub-Commander?"

Kensuke glanced up from the paperwork on the desk and looked over the edge and down at the Magi stations at the base of the Commander's Roost.

"What is it?" he asked, sounding bored. Which he was. Very bored.

"I have a Pilot the Magi are telling me is deceased accessing the Eva Cages…"

"Which Pilot?"

"Suzuhara, sir."

Kensuke sighed. Why was Hikari here so late? Hadn't she gone with Asuka for her yearly bar visit?

"Don't bother her. I'll be back shortly." he said, neatly stacking the paperwork to the side before getting up and stepping over to the Commander's Lift.

"Yes, sir."

000

"Do you remember, what happened back then?" Hikari asked quietly, "Can you remember?"

Unit-01 remained still and silent, locked down in the cage restraints, as Hikari leaned against the railing with her back to it.

"You managed to prevent Instrumentality, and gave us a chance to lock it away where no one will ever be able to start it again."

Hikari spun around to face the cyborg, her expression so blank it would have made Rei proud had she still been around to see it.

"But you hurt my best friend, in a way I might not ever be able to forgive you for." Hikari, woman of self-control and manners, slammed her fist against the railing, "You saved everyone else, and then ran away again!"

The Eva remained unmoving, a thing of flesh and metal seemingly frozen in time, as Hikari's accusation echoed through the Cage.

"But no, you couldn't just run away. Oh, no. You had to haunt her too!" she jabbed a finger at the scowling visage, "She's cried for years! Because you don't have the decency to either vanish or come back!"

Hikari took a deep breath, looking down as both hands gripped the railing. Sighing, she looked up at Unit-01's face.

"I know it isn't all your fault, Shinji. You aren't the one who chooses to be stuck inside that thing," Hikari scowled, "But you are the one who decides when you get out! So why haven't you!"

In the ringing silence that followed, Unit-01 remained silent and still, and Hikari noticed faint footsteps echoing in the massive room. Turning, she saw one of her old classmates and the current Sub-commander of Nerv-Tokyo-3, Kensuke Aida.

"Wow, Iincho, what set you off?" he asked, his expression one of amusement and curiosity as he walked over next to her and leaned backwards against the railing. His uniform was crisp and neat, but his hair was still longish and messy. All he really lacked was the camera he used to always have in his hands.

Hikari remained just as silent as the Eva, turning back to glare at it. Kensuke noticed she had her hair down, her typical single braid missing, a style she had taken too when they started high school.

"Asuka broke down again." she stated.

"So?" Kensuke said, wincing when he realized how that must sound, "I mean… Come on Hikari, she does this at least once a year since she came back here. Why go off on the Eva now?"

"Because this time I saw the trigger…" she whispered.

"Huh?"

Hikari turned and glanced at Kensuke, then looked back at the beast.

"We saw Shinji." she frowned, "Well, a ghost really…"

"I hope you'll forgive me if I ask just what you're smoking…" he deadpanned, focusing his gaze on Hikari's face.

"I saw him, Kensuke. He was there, but… at the say time he wasn't…" she frowned, "I saw his mouth move, and Asuka responded. Then he just… vanished…"

"Anything else?" he asked, sensing that wasn't all.

"no… yeah, there was one thing…" Hikari looked away, "Remember how you told me one time how you kept getting intermittent pattern blues?"

"…yes…" he answered cautiously, wondering if this might have something to do with the pattern blue they'd detected earlier that night.

"Well… after Asuka started crying, she suddenly asked me if I trusted her," Hikari turned back towards the Eva, biting her lip as she paused a moment, trying to decided if she really wanted to continue, "I told her of course, and suddenly her hands glowed orange and she grabbed my hands…"

"She used her AT-Field… What happened Hikari?" he asked concern obvious in his voice.

"I…I saw Shinji die…" she whispered, the pain evident in her tone.

Kensuke's jaw dropped in shock.

"I watched, from Asuka's perspective, as Shinji died." Hikari turned to Kensuke, "I felt like I was watching Touji die all over again. Asuka got to his plug and he was just gone."

Kensuke took a hesitant step towards his longtime friend, wrapping his arms around her shoulders as she started to quietly cry.

You bitch. he shot a glare at the Eva. He knew the secret of Yui, the woman trapped inside the monster known as Unit-01. You couldn't just leave us be and keep your precious son. You had to torment us too.

"Hikari," he carefully pulled back, placing his hands on her shoulders as his face took on a determined edge, "Go home, and get Asuka to come in to Nerv tomorrow evening. I have a few matters I must attend to."

Hikari looked at him confused as she wiped the tears from her face, but nodded her acceptance of his request. Turning, she walked out of the Cage back the way she had come. After she left, Kensuke turned back to the Eva.

"You f_ing bitch." he said coldly, in a manner reminiscent of the late Commander Ikari. "You wanna mess with my friends? I knew you should have been dismantled."

Kensuke turned to leave the Cage, but as he reached the door to the lift, he turned back and called across the chamber.

"I'm taking Shinji back. And so help me, if you scramble him or keep him from me, I will have you chopped down very, very slowly into lots of little pieces. I know you can still feel, and I will make you suffer for what you did."

Stepping into the lift, he missed the faint glow appear in Unit-01's eyes.
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A/N: This one was inspired by a song and rereading the other chapters in "Pilot's Table".